Chinese people are familiar with magpies due to a legend of a pair of lovers in which the magpies formed a bridge for them to meet each other once a year.

In real life, people love to catch magpies in the wood for breeding as they believe magpies will bring them good luck while they tweets are sweet to hear.

In small towns like Bentong, there are many magpie fanciers and you can see a big crowd gathering at the bird park every morning.

Dozens of bird cages are hung on poles or are placed on tables in rows so that the magpies can compete in the singing contest.

The entire place will instantly be filled with a chorus of magpie tweets while the bird owners sit quietly and listen attentively to the symphonic concert of nature.

Magpies love fighting

In the Chinese legend, magpies helped the lovers by forming a bridge. As a result, many might misperceive them to be gentle. As a matter of fact, magpie is a kind of arrogant and aggressive bird which prefers to be alone. Therefore, besides enjoying their singing, people also love watching magpies fight.

Pan Zhi Wen, an experienced magpie enthusiast, told Sin Chew Daily that watching magpies fight could offer a moral lesson. He said while magpies would fight aggressively with one another, they wouldn't hurt their rivals and the loser would surrender and walk away spontaneously like a gentleman.

Phobia towards strangers

The most incredible thing in magpies is that although they love fighting they are very scared of strangers. In order to get better pictures of the birds, we had attempted to get close to the bird cage, but our advances was instantly stopped by the bird owners who were worried that the birds would get scared.

How do we know if a magpie is terrified? To get the answer we need to refer to the tweeting tones of the bird, and we need a truly experienced bird listener to tell the difference.

Best place to appreciate birds

Vice chairman of Bentong Bird Park Association, Du Jian Ming said the association was set up more than 30 years ago and is the most ideal gathering place for magpie fanciers.

The association currently has almost 120 members and some of the older members have joined the association since they were. They have a deep feeling for the magpies and this has also served as a spiritual sustenance for them.

Another feature of magpies is that they will constantly tweet seeing their owner back home and this has amused their masters tremendously.

Du said people who like birds would enjoy the tweets of magpies but those who dislike birds would see them as a nuisance.

"We have offered a platform for bird fanciers. They can bring along their magpies here and appreciate the sweet songs of the birds.

"Imagine if the same happens in your house, I bet you will get some complaints from your neighbours."

Magpies are usually caught in the woods. Bird breeders normally prefer young birds as they can enjoy the process of growing the birds.

Training magpies to bathe by themselves

It has become a common practice among bird fancies in Bentong to train the birds to bathe by themselves. They will set up a little pond next to the bird cage and allow the bird to soak in the water and wash and scrub its body itself.

After the bath, the owner will normally allow the bird to enjoy a sunbath before he takes the bird to join other birds in the symphonic concert of nature!

The taboos of magpies:

1. Strangers
2. Helmets, glasses and hats
3. Wearing red
4. Umbrellas. (Translated by LIM LIY EE/Sin Chew Daily)