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The conservationist's vision darts across miles of dense fields, looking for any movement in the pre-dawn darkness.

He utters less than a whisper as we try to find a place of cover in the grasslands. Behind us, the huge urban center of Beijing has yet to wake. During the vigil, we hear only our own breath.

And then, as the sky turns a shade lighter before dawn, the sound of footsteps emerges. The poachers are here.

Caught

Overhead, countless migratory birds, some tiny enough that they could rest in the palm of your hand, are migrating south for winter.

They have taken advantage of the warmer months in northern regions, consuming insects and fruit. As the year winds down and cold breezes bring the early cold of winter, they journey to southern locales to breed and eat.

China is home to more than 1,500 bird species, which is about thirteen percent of the world's total – more than 800 of those are migratory birds. Four of the nine major paths they follow cross through China.

The patch of grassland where we were, on the outskirts of the Chinese capital, is an haven for small birds – any further and the city skies offer scant chance to rest among forests of concrete.

It is also an oasis for the poachers and their "fine nets", so fine you can barely see them.

The one we nearly walked into was extending over half the length of the field and held up with wooden sticks. At its center, a meadow pipit was struggling frantically to free his legs, but the more it moved, the more its claws became tangled.

It was a protected songbird, a protected bird in China, and an important "indicator species" – meaning if its population is healthy, so is its ecosystem.

Hunting the Hunters

This activist, performs this duty for free using his personal funds. He has given up on many sleeping hours to rescue birds, and he has spent the last decade urging the police in Beijing to take this crime seriously.

"In the early days, authorities were indifferent," he says.

So he enlisted helpers who did care and established a group known as the Bird Protection Unit. He organized community gatherings and brought in the leaders of the relevant authorities. These consistent and determined acts of advocacy seem to have paid off. The police found that apprehending illegal hunters also helped in identifying other kinds of criminal activity.

"We found our objectives became somewhat shared," Silva says, while pointing out that the response is not uniform.

His passion for avian life started in childhood. He grew up in the nineties in a much changed capital.

He recalls roaming through the grasslands on the city's edges where he found birds, frogs and snakes. "However, beginning in the 2000s, everything changed."

Rapid economic growth brought millions of rural workers to cities. This expansion meant grasslands were viewed as land for construction, not sanctuaries to preserve.

The change stunned Silva. The grasslands receded, as did the habitats they supported.

"I made the choice back then to work in conservation and I took this path," he says.

It has not been an simple journey. A major Beijing's biggest bird dealers found out he was under scrutiny by Silva and fought back.

"He gathered several of his associates who surrounded me and beat me up," Silva remembers. He says he went to the police but the perpetrators were not brought to justice.

He has also lost his team of helpers over the years. This work demands patience and night vigils. Silva says few people are willing to take on the difficult – and sometimes dangerous job.

"I do this full-time," he says. "I treat it as a mission because if you want to solve this big problem, you must devote yourself wholeheartedly. You cannot be half-hearted."

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

So he has adopted new ways to hunt the hunters.

He studies satellite imagery to find the paths created 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 scores of small birds during darkness.

"Certain prized species sell for a premium," Silva says. "In big cities like Beijing and Tianjin, those who want to keep birds are now often affluent."

While there are environmental regulations in place, Silva reckons the penalties to punish the crime do not outweigh the potential profits of trapping and trading songbirds.

Keeping a caged bird was – and for some generations in China, still is – a status symbol. This dates back to the imperial era. Nobles and elites would build elaborate bamboo cages to display their birds.

This custom that continues mainly among older individuals in their later years. Silva says older Chinese people don't realise they are breaking the law, or grasp that numerous birds were killed in a trap for them to purchase a caged bird.

"This generation often lacked enough to eat in their youth. Now with a little money, they have adopted the practice of caging birds," he says. "The nation progressed so fast, there was no time to raise awareness about ecology. Once people's attitudes are set, they're really hard to change."

Apprehended

Along a riverside path in Beijing, a vendor has several small cages with tiny twittering birds.

Another man is positioned near a nearby market holding a bird cage covered by a black veil. He tells passers-by discreetly that his songbird is rare, worth about 1900 yuan.

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

The area by the river stretches for several miles and on a sunny weekday morning, there were shoppers browsing everything from vintage jewellery to false teeth.

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

Music was blasting from a speaker under the low trees where a group of elderly ladies were choreographing a fan dance. Close by 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 today there would be no sales because the police had arrived. They were interviewing the bird owners and recording details. Defiant, one man claimed he was {taking his caged bird for a walk|simply exercising his