Birds Are Judged on Song for Prizes Worth Years of Wages and the Wild Population Is Paying
Songbird contests are a serious competitive circuit across Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand, with a conservation bill attached.
Bird singing contests are one of the largest participation sports in Southeast Asia and almost never covered as sport. Birds are scored on song quality, volume and stamina, in rounds, in front of judges.
Indonesia has the biggest circuit. Events run weekly or monthly and can involve up to 1,000 birds. An April meeting in Sukabumi drew hundreds of entrants with motorcycles and cash on the prize table. Acoustic biologist Benjamin Mirin has put the top prizes at "sometimes up to 10 years' salary".
The numbers behind it are the problem. Estimates put 66 to 84 million caged birds on Java alone, including more than three million white-rumped shamas and two million oriental magpie-robins. Across Indonesia, roughly 90 million people, about 30 per cent of the population, are estimated to keep 164 to 187 million wild-caught songbirds. Mortality in transit runs between 30 and 80 per cent.
An international expert group has identified 52 species most affected. Fewer than 100 Javan green magpies are thought to remain in the wild, and the black-winged myna and Bali starling are also critically endangered.
Trade is documented in Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore as well. The Wak Gatak rehabilitation centre, open since 2022, has handled nearly 3,000 birds from 45 species and released 348.