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Silva Gu's eyes scan across vast expanses of tall grassland, searching for any movement in the pre-dawn darkness.

He utters a muted voice as we try to find a place of cover in the fields. Behind us, the huge urban center of Beijing remains asleep. As we wait, we hear only our own breath.

Suddenly, as the sky begins to brighten with the approaching day, there is the crunch of footsteps. The poachers are here.

Trapped

Overhead, a multitude of winged travelers, many so small that they could rest in the cup of a hand, are migrating south for winter.

They have taken advantage of the long summer days in northern regions, feasting on insects and fruit. As the year nears its end and cold breezes bring the early cold of winter, they are flying to warmer places to breed and eat.

There are more than 1,500 bird species, accounting for thirteen percent of the world's total – more than 800 of those are migratory birds. Several of the major paths they follow cross through China.

The area of meadow where we were, on the edges of the Chinese capital, is an haven for small birds – any further and the urban landscape offer scant chance to rest among clusters of concrete.

It is also an oasis for the poachers and their "mist nets", so thin you can hardly spot them.

The trap we stumbled upon was strung across a large section of the field and held up with bamboo poles. At its center, a tiny bird was struggling frantically to escape, but the more it struggled, the more its claws became tangled.

This was a meadow pipit, a species under protection in China, and an important "bio-indicator" – that means if its population is healthy, so is its ecosystem.

Tracking the Trappers

Silva, who is in his 30s, carries out this mission for free using his personal funds. He has sacrificed many sleeping hours to release trapped birds, and he has spent the last 10 years convincing the police in Beijing to prioritize this issue.

"Initially, authorities were indifferent," he states.

So he recruited volunteers who were concerned and launched a group called the Beijing Migratory Bird Squad. He held public meetings and invited the officials of the local police and forestry bureau. These small and persistent acts of persuasion appear to have worked. The police realized that catching poachers also led to identifying other kinds of criminal activity.

"We found our objectives became somewhat shared," Silva says, noting that enforcement is still patchy.

His passion for avian life began during childhood. He grew up in the 1990s in a distinct era for the city.

He remembers exploring the fields on the city's edges where he discovered birds, frogs and snakes. "But starting from the 2000s, everything changed."

Industrialization brought a huge influx of rural workers to cities. This rapid urbanisation meant grasslands were considered empty places to build, not conservation areas to preserve.

This shift shocked him. The grasslands receded, as did the habitats they supported.

"I made the choice back then to pursue environmental protection and I followed this course," he says.

It has not been an easy life. A major Beijing's biggest bird dealers found out he was being investigated by Silva and retaliated.

"He gathered several of his associates who surrounded me and assaulted me," Silva recalls. He says he reported to the police but the perpetrators were not held accountable.

He has also lost his army of volunteers over the years. This work demands covert operations and lost sleep. Silva says few people are prepared for the challenging and occasionally risky job.

"I do this full-time," he says. "I treat it as a mission because if you want to address this major issue, you must commit completely. You cannot be half-hearted."

He says donations pays for some of the costs – more than 100,000 yuan a year – but support has waned because of the slowing economy.

So he has adopted new ways to track the poachers.

He analyzes satellite imagery to find the paths created by the poachers. He maps those against the birds' flight paths and looks for areas where they may stop for the night. The satellite images can even show lines of net traps which can catch scores of small birds during darkness.

"Siberian rubythroats and bluethroats command a premium," Silva says. "In big cities like Beijing and Tianjin, those who want to own songbirds are now often affluent."

While there are environmental regulations in place, Silva believes the fines to punish the crime do not exceed the potential profits of catching and selling songbirds.

Keeping a caged bird was – and for some people in China, still is – a status symbol. This originates from the Qing dynasty. Nobles and elites would build ornate bamboo cages to display their birds.

It's a tradition that persists mainly among retired men in their 60s or 70s. Silva says some elderly citizens may not understand they are breaking the law, or grasp that so many more birds were killed in a trap for them to purchase a caged bird.

"This generation often lacked enough to eat growing up. Now with a little money, they have inherited the habit and custom of keeping birds in cages," he says. "The nation progressed so fast, there was no time to raise awareness about the environment. Once adults' values are formed, they're really hard to change."

Disrupted

On a long low wall in Beijing, a trader has several small cages with tiny twittering birds.

A separate individual stands outside a nearby market holding a bird cage shrouded in a dark cloth. He tells passers-by discreetly that his songbird is rare, worth about 1900 yuan.

This is a glimpse of an traditional side of the city where informal vendors have established a niche trade.

The area alongside the water stretches for several miles and on a typical day, there were people looking at everything from old trinkets to false teeth.

Information suggested that protected birds could be bought in a nearby green space. It was easy to find.

Loud music played from a speaker under the low trees where a group of elderly ladies were performing a traditional dance. Close by several men, all in their later years, had gathered with bird cages – some had two or three in their hands. Most were covered in black fabric.

But on this occasion there would be no sales because the police had arrived. They were interviewing the bird owners and recording details. Unyielding, one man said he was {taking his caged bird for a walk|simply exercising his