Releasing Birds to Freedom: The Global Exploitation of Songbirds

Remember Pushkin's poem:

In a foreign land, I reverently observe,

The old custom of my homeland;

I release a bird to freedom,

On the bright spring holiday.

I found solace:

Why should I complain to God,

When at least one creature

I could grant freedom to!

(A. S. Pushkin. 1823)

The custom mentioned in Pushkin's poem survived among the people until the 21st century. In some villages, it is still remembered! It was associated with spring holidays. In some parts of Russia, birds were released on Easter, in others — on the holiday of Annunciation. Dahl's proverb goes: "Annunciation — the release of birds to freedom."

In the book "The Life of the Russian People" by ethnographer Alexander Vlasevich Tereshchenko, I came across the following about the custom of releasing birds from captivity:

"In St. Petersburg, a touching custom has been preserved, which, as they say, also exists in many parts of Russia. During Holy Week and Bright Week, small birds are carried in cages: larks, tits, thrushes, and sold with the condition of release. A charitable and simultaneously touching thought — both for those who catch for release sales and those who buy to free them from captivity. ...I know many examples of Russian girls pooling their money to buy several cages and release the birds. What joy it must bring to the liberators!"

Touching, of course... But what foolishness, don't you think?! Catching birds just to release them later! For bird-catchers and traders, it's clear. In the spirit of a perfectly modern capitalist society: just business, nothing personal. It doesn't matter how many birds are injured during capture or die in cages before release. The main thing is profit.

But for ordinary people, buyers, such a custom must have existed earlier, as a tradition. Traders could not have invented it for profit! They only took advantage of it. And this tradition is not Christian but much older. This is convincingly indicated by the correlation of bird releases with various dates (and different Christian holidays) in different localities. All ancient customs are known not only to one nation but to many, or at least to several. In the memory of some, customs have been better preserved; in others — worse. Among some peoples, the oldest explanations of the custom have survived; among others — newer ones. The custom of releasing birds from cages is known to all Slavic peoples — Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians. An old folk explanation of this custom states that birds released to freedom intercede with God on behalf of the person who released them.

Is this the ancient meaning of the custom to release birds in spring? Or is there something more?

Note: the ancient Russian custom is entirely unrelated to hunting. Russians usually released forest songbirds during spring holidays. In old Moscow, in the Hunter's Row, at the Bird Market, forest birds were sold as songbirds for homes. The custom of keeping forest songbirds in cages at home was widespread among Russians as a domestic tradition. This helped preserve the ancient custom.

Ethnographer Pyotr Vasilyevich Ivanov wrote in 1907 that Ukrainians living in Kupyansk, on Annunciation Day, "release from cages singing birds: siskins, bullfinches, goldfinches, tits into freedom so that they may bless God and ask Him for happiness for the one who freed them from captivity." Again, we encounter: "singing birds."

In my wanderings through the Russian Taiga, I still occasionally come across remnants of various ancient customs. And in distant villages, children still catch birds, keep them at home during the winter, and release them in spring. Explanations for this practice exist too, especially among descendants of old Russian settlers in Siberia.

During particularly severe frosts, the silence in the taiga becomes unique. A dead silence. The frost sharpens under clear skies, with the wind dying down. Not a breath, not even the slightest movement of air. Only the intensifying cold killing all living things. Only the occasional crack of breaking branches and a deathly silence. Among the peoples of the North, including the Russian North and their descendants who settled the Siberian Taiga, the concepts of death and the demise of all life are closely tied to the cold. It resonates with Ragnarok among the Northern Europeans.

The singing of birds was believed to counteract the deathly silence. And people kept singing birds in their homes throughout the harsh winter to fend off the cold. And in spring, with gratitude, they released them.

I was born and raised among the coniferous forests of Western Siberia, and as I recall from my childhood, we constantly picked up freezing birds in January-February to release them into freedom by mid-March! It seems to me that the roots of these traditions stem from the salvation of freezing birds.

That’s how it is...

I have traveled through Southeast Asian countries and interacted with representatives of local environmental organizations. When I first visited, I was struck by how developed the network for selling songbirds was. Later, visiting local provinces and city outskirts, I observed this picture: almost everyone on the streets has cages with small birds hanging. Colorful, large and small, all kinds! And in many places, it is very important for each family to have a bird singing more beautifully than the neighbors’ birds.

More curious was observing apartment buildings, cluttered with junk and immersed in extreme poverty. Sometimes you look at the children — skinny, dirty, watching you eat an apple — and their gaze asks to share food!

But no! Adults still save up money to buy a cage and keep a bird in captivity. And all of this looks frightening, a stark demonstration of the incredible madness humanity has plunged into.

When I spoke with environmentalists in Asian countries, they told me that here the bird trade is highly developed, and it is now one of the main factors contributing to the decline in bird populations worldwide.

Birds are captured in the wild, transported to Asian countries, and sold. Moreover, there are many orders for endangered rare bird species, but smuggling them is challenging — you could even end up in prison! Cunning traders dye birds to resemble other species and smuggle them across borders, later selling them for huge sums.

In the wild, birds are a primary indicator of the health of biological systems and, as agreed upon by many global specialists, birds form the foundation of the Earth's biogeocenoses' immune system. They ensure the global transfer of nutrients and seeds in the wild, heal trees, and maintain environmental balance. Equilibrium!

If you've noticed fewer birds singing in the forest, it means the forest is sick, and the ecosystems are degrading! This is the first and most evident sign of the state of nature around you.

The difference between the traditions of releasing birds in Europe and Russia and those in Southeast Asian countries is that here, birds are not released at all. They are kept in cages until death! Moreover, the birds are brought in from equatorial tropical forests and kept in environments alien to them. Releasing these birds into the wild all at once would provoke an "invasive catastrophe," leading to irreversible consequences! A massive influx of invasive bird species could completely destroy the already fragile local ecosystems.

So it turns out that birds are massively caught from one ecosystem for sale, and in other countries, these birds are kept in cages as a display of, albeit small, power over another being.

From helping birds by rescuing frozen ones during frosts and nursing them back to health until spring to the global exploitation of wildlife and the thriving industry of songbird sales. Here is the stark contrast between actions and how traditions evolve over time among different peoples, cultures, and countries.

Hug a tree or chop it down.

Feed a bird during the frost or bait it so it trusts you, comes closer, and is brutally killed by a human.

Chop down a fir tree for New Year, so it slowly dies in a stuffy apartment decorated with plastic toys. Or take the kids to the forest to hang treats on a tree for squirrels and birds! Pay tribute to nature, our Mother Earth.

© PAVEL PASHKOV