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The activist's vision darts over vast expanses of dense fields, looking for signs of life in the early morning gloom.

He utters a hushed tone as they attempt to locate a place of cover in the fields. Behind us, the huge urban center of Beijing has yet to wake. During the vigil, we hear only the quiet of the morning.

Suddenly, as the sky starts to lighten with the approaching day, we hear footsteps. The poachers are here.

Caught

Overhead, billions of birds, many so small that they can fit in the palm of your hand, are traveling to the south for winter.

They have taken advantage of the long summer days in Siberia, or Mongolia, consuming bugs and berries. As the year winds down and cold breezes bring the initial freeze of winter, they are flying to more temperate climates to find food and shelter.

The nation hosts 1500-plus bird species, accounting for 13% of the world's total – over eight hundred of those are migratory birds. Several of the major flyways they follow converge in China.

This particular field being monitored, on the outskirts of the Chinese capital, is an oasis for small birds – farther in and the city skies offer few options to rest among towering rows of concrete.

It is equally attractive for the poachers and their "fine nets", so fine you can hardly spot them.

The trap we stumbled upon was stretched across half the length of the field and propped up with bamboo poles. In the middle, a small finch was struggling frantically to free his legs, but the more it struggled, the more its claws became tangled.

This was a protected songbird, a protected bird in China, and an important "indicator species" – that means if its population is healthy, so is its habitat.

Pursuing the Poachers

Silva, who is in his 30s, does this work for free using his personal funds. He has forgone many sleeping hours to release trapped birds, and he has spent the last 10 years convincing the police in Beijing to take this crime seriously.

"Back in 2015, no-one cared," he states.

So he gathered a team who were concerned and formed a group called the Bird Protection Unit. He held public meetings and brought in the leaders of the relevant authorities. These consistent and determined acts of advocacy appear to have worked. The police discovered that catching poachers also helped in uncovering other kinds of illegal operations.

"It became clear our objectives became partially aligned," Silva says, noting that the response is not uniform.

Silva's love of birds started in childhood. He was raised in the 1990s in a very different Beijing.

He recalls roaming through the grasslands on the city's edges where he encountered birds, frogs and snakes. "But starting from the 2000s, everything changed."

Industrialization brought a huge influx of rural workers to cities. This expansion meant grasslands were viewed as areas for development, not protected zones to preserve.

The transformation was alarming. The grasslands receded, as did the ecosystems they sustained.

"I made the choice back then to dedicate myself to preservation and I followed this course," he says.

This has not made for an easy life. A major Beijing's biggest bird dealers discovered he was being investigated by Silva and fought back.

"He gathered several of his accomplices 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 seen the departure of his team of helpers over the years. This work demands stealth and sleepless nights. Silva says not many are prepared for the challenging and occasionally risky job.

"This is my full-time commitment," he says. "I treat it as a mission because if you want to solve this big problem, you must give it your all. You cannot be half-hearted."

He says fundraising pays for some of the costs – more than 100,000 yuan annually – but funding has declined because of the slowing economy.

So he has found new ways to track the poachers.

He studies aerial photos to find the paths worn away by the poachers. He charts these against the birds' flight paths and looks for areas where they may rest. The satellite images can even show lines of net traps which can catch hundreds 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 keep birds are now quite wealthy."

Although there are environmental regulations in place, Silva argues the fines to punish the crime do not outweigh the potential profits of trapping and trading songbirds.

Owning a pet bird was – and for some generations in China, still is – a mark of prestige. This dates back to the Qing dynasty. Nobles and elites would build elaborate bamboo cages to display their birds.

It's a tradition that continues mainly among older individuals in their 60s or 70s. Silva says older Chinese people don't realise they are committing a wildlife crime, or understand that so many more birds were killed in a trap so they could buy a caged bird.

"This generation didn't even have enough to eat in their youth. Now with some disposable income, they have inherited the practice of keeping birds in cages," he says. "China developed so fast, there was little opportunity to educate people about the environment. Once adults' values are set, they're really hard to change."

Apprehended

On a long low wall in Beijing, a vendor has several small cages with chirping songbirds.

A separate individual stands outside a local market holding a bird cage shrouded in a black veil. He tells passers-by discreetly that his songbird is valuable, worth nearly 1900 yuan.

This is a glimpse of an old Beijing where informal vendors have created their own market.

The area by the river extends over several miles and on a typical day, there were people looking at everything from old trinkets to false teeth.

Information suggested that wild songbirds could be bought in a small park. The location was not concealed.

Loud music played from a speaker in a shaded area where a troop of elderly ladies were choreographing a fan dance. Nearby several men, all in their later years, had congregated with bird cages – some had multiple in their hands. Most were concealed by dark cloth.

But on this occasion there would be no sales because the police had arrived. They were questioning the bird owners and taking names. Defiant, one man claimed he was {taking his caged bird for a walk|simply exercising his