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  PlanetArk 30 Nov 05
Shanghai Stops Songbird Sales
Story by Lucy Hornby

SHANGHAI - A chirpy corner of Shanghai will fall silent this week after the city government bans the sale of pet birds as a precaution against bird flu.

But the parakeets and brown songbirds in the bamboo cages lining the city's Flower, Bird, Fish and Insect market will be spared for the moment, since the government's ban on selling birds from Dec. 1 does not require them to be culled as long as China's commercial hub remains bird-flu free.

"We'll all contribute to keep them somewhere until bird flu passes," said a woman, knitting a sweater in front of a row of tidy red-billed Leiothrix, known in Chinese as "pining love" birds.

The market is a cacophony of bird calls, puppies barking and the whirr of crickets. Smoke curls toward the plastic roof as gamblers cluster around a cricket fight. Bird sellers said sales had fallen due to fears of bird flu.

Recently, no new bird shipments have come to Shanghai from the southwestern province of Sichuan -- the main source of the birds -- due to bird flu precautions, and sales are below their normal level of at least 20 birds a month from the bigger stalls.

But the sellers were unconcerned about the health of their own birds, which sell for nearly 100 yuan (US$12) each. "The disease came from other countries and was brought by migratory birds, but mine are never loose," said the woman knitting the sweater, adding "you can use my opinions but not my name". "If they were loose, or around chickens, they might get it but mine are always in their cages."

Experts fear the H5N1 virus, which causes bird flu, could mutate into a form that could spread easily among humans. The virus has killed nearly 70 people in Asia since late 2003, though it remains hard for humans to catch. China has culled more than 20 million birds and reported 24 outbreaks since mid-October, while two of the three people confirmed to have caught the disease have died.

Chinese retirees, who often take pet birds for morning walks in covered cages, are being more cautious, sellers said.

"People's birds are really precious to them so they don't take them out for air any more or buy any new ones, because they don't want their birds to catch bird flu," said an aproned woman selling bird feed.

At another stall selling silkworms, a man clipped the end of a cocoon, squeezed out the caterpillar and flipped it into a wooden tray marked 40 yuan a pound. Silkworm sales are still strong, he said.

"Shanghai doesn't have bird flu yet. As long as it doesn't crop up here, we're good," he said, dragging on a cigarette. "But if it does, it's all over, because then people will have to kill their birds at home too." (US$1 = 8.0825 yuan)
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