In October 2020, he accidentally saw a post from a netizen selling air guns, so he suddenly wanted to shoot birds. So he bought an air gun and a mold for making air gun lead bullets from a netizen. After successfully trying to make lead bullets, he excitedly went to the bamboo forest in his hometown to try it.

But he ignored some "small details", He didn’t have a hunting license and knew very little about animal species. He didn’t know what he could and couldn’t hunt.

After successfully catching two birds in the first experiment, Zheng was so happy and felt so good! So I started to frequently invite good friends to go hunting in Qinghu Street, Changtai Town and other places in Jiangshan City.

Time flew by in January 2021. When Zheng and his friend Mao were chasing hares, they accidentally discovered a fluffy bird in a nearby bush, with two tufts of crests on both sides. It’s tilted up, it’s obviously an owl! Zheng didn't think much, and immediately asked Mao to assist him, shaking the owl with a flashlight, then shot and wounded it himself, and then took the owl home.

It was only after returning home that Zheng realized, "That's wrong! What if this is some kind of protected animal?" So with the help of a powerful network, he soon discovered the owl he and his friends had captured. It’s a collared owl, a national second-level protected animal! But he was not panic at all, because after checking, he found that the collared owl was only slightly injured, so he thought to himself, wouldn't it be good to release it? Before releasing the animal the next day, he also took a video to show off his "accomplishment" of capturing the national second-level protected animal.

After that, he started hunting without a license again, and from time to time he would invite a few friends to hunt for fun in various parts of the country. Then the public security organs have focused on him because the video he shot was circulated.

“I obviously let him go!” Zheng felt very innocent.

In this regard, the judge of the Jiangshan Court of Zhejiang Province who handled this case said: "It is a good thing to 'correct when you know your mistakes', but it will be too late to correct after you have already committed a crime! In this case, Zheng and Mao Although the collared owl, a national second-level protected animal, was released, the crime of endangering precious and endangered wild animals has been established."

Because the illegally obtained protected animals Zheng and Mao have been released, they After being educated, he expressed his understanding and was willing to accept the punishment. Therefore, the court treated him leniently and sentenced Zheng to 8 months' imprisonment, suspended for 1 year and 6 months, and fined 6,000 yuan for the crime of endangering endangered wildlife; Mao was sentenced to 7 months' imprisonment, suspended for 1 year, as an aide.A fine of 5,000 yuan is imposed.

Basically, there is no jail time and only a fine.

The description of the case has ended here, but since we have talked about the collared owl, let us introduce this bird a little bit.

The collared screech owl is a member of the family Owlidae, Scops Owl owl. I think its appearance is very in line with human aesthetics. Their body length is about 23 centimeters and they are small birds. Their eyes are very large and appear orange or brown. Their fur colors are very mixed, mainly gray or gray. They are mainly sandy brown, with a slight yellowish tinge on the belly; because of their fluffy hair, they look like a doll without a neck at all, and their small ear tufts look like cat ears, which is very cute in humans.

Because of their petite size, their prey is different from other relatives. They are mainly insects. Of course, they will occasionally catch small lizards and small mice. Therefore, their habitats are generally selected from forests, shrubs, secondary forests from plains to about 2,400 meters above sea level, as well as open countryside and woods and bamboo forests around towns. These areas have plenty of food and can hide themselves. It is a hunting method that facilitates them to attack from high places.

They are currently known to be distributed in southern my country, northern India, northern Pakistan, Bangladesh and the eastern Himalayas. The scale of its global species has not yet been quantified, so the size of its population cannot be determined. Combined with the situation of habitat encroachment by humans, it is finally positioned as a national second-level protected animal.