“Falcon Girl”
Digital Print on Hahnemuehle Photo Rag 308 gsm (100% acid free cotton)
Editions : 20

All images © Andrea Innocent 2005 - 2008

2005 - Ishibashi Misato, an 11 year old girl living in Saga Prefecture, owns and trains two birds of prey, a Male Harris Hawk named “Momotaro” (from a Japanese folktale of the same name) and a female Peregrine Falcon named “Shiro” (Japanese for white). There are many farmers in the area where Misato lives and crows are a constant nuisance throughout the year.

Misato's father is a member of a group that promotes natural farming methods, and crows like eating the persimmons and pears from the group's orchard. After collecting and studying information on different training styles from Japan and other
countries, Misato's father devised his own falcon-training method in order to scare the crows away from the orchards. As Misato’s
father is away from home a lot due to his work schedule, she feeds, weighs, trains and works the birds each day, she says they have become part of her family. Misato wants to become a veterinarian when she grows up.