Irresponsible bird photographers pose a threat to nature

We Chinese seem to have the tendency to enjoy anything foreign with Chinese characteristics. As a birdwatcher, I have witnessed how we have turned a Western hobby into a Chinese-style obsession in the past 11 years.

In 2004 when I started the recreational activity, which was born in Britain and North America in the late 19th century, it was considered an environmental-friendly thing that would help raise our environmental awareness, which supposedly lagged far behind those in the West. It had been advocated by a Beijing-based grassroots environmental NGO (Green Earth Volunteers) since 1996, even though as I knew, the NGO founder had never been a birdwatcher. So many of the first Chinese birdwatchers were college students, environmental NGOs' members or volunteers and were truly green.

We gathered at an online chatroom, sponsored by World Wide Fund for Nature's China office, spreading sighting news of "rarities", discussing identity details of different species, sharing bird photos and arranging birding trips around the country. Everybody was known to the others.