Canoli the Cocky

Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, Australia

Public art

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Current

Checked by Project Big Things · Aug 2026

This Big Thing is recorded as still being here.

A large chainsaw-carved sulphur-crested cockatoo gifted to Wagga Wagga and displayed at the entrance to the city zoo.

Free
onsite
Access hours apply
onsite

Private to your Passport.

PLAN YOUR VISIT

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Canoli the Cocky

This pin marks the Big Thing itself. If stopping, choose a safe and legal place nearby.

Site-level location · 35.1328° S, 147.3667° E

FIELD GUIDE

The story

Canoli is a sulphur-crested cockatoo, carved from a log with a chainsaw, and he is named after a Sicilian pastry.

He was made by Justin McClelland in 2017 at the Ganmain Show – that is, in public, as a demonstration, from a single piece of timber, in the course of a country agricultural show. Chainsaw carving is a show-circuit tradition in rural New South Wales, performed against the clock in front of a crowd, and most of what it produces is sold off the same afternoon. Very occasionally something comes out of it good enough to be given to a city.

Canoli was gifted to Wagga Wagga and now stands at the entrance to the Wagga Wagga Zoo and Aviary precinct, which is the right home for him twice over: a bird at the front of an aviary, and a piece of live-carved timber at the front of a place people bring children.

Sulphur-crested cockatoos are the loudest, boldest and most destructive of Australia's common parrots – birds that strip windowsills for entertainment and are widely regarded with a mixture of affection and irritation. A carved one with a raised crest captures the attitude better than a smooth moulded sculpture could, and the grain and tool marks of the chainsaw work are worth looking at closely.

He is widely treated locally as a mascot for the city.

What the timber is, and his exact dimensions, are not established in the record.

Wagga Wagga is the largest inland city in New South Wales, on the Murrumbidgee in the Riverina, and it is a regional centre rather than a tourist town. Its Big Thing being a chainsaw carving from a country show, gifted rather than commissioned, fits that character better than a fabricated fibreglass object would have.

The placement at the zoo and aviary is also more considered than it first appears. Wagga's zoo sits inside the Botanic Gardens and is free to enter – a genuinely well-used local facility rather than a paid attraction – so the cockatoo greets residents at least as often as visitors.

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PRACTICAL

Plan your stop

WHAT TO EXPECT

Canoli was carved by Justin McClelland in 2017 and is associated with the Wagga Wagga Zoo and Aviary precinct.

ACCESS

Use the Botanic Gardens and Zoo visitor facilities. The zoo is free but has published opening days and hours.

COMMUNITY

Visitor Log

WHAT'S NEXT

Find another Big Thing nearby

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Current

The Big Koala

Gundagai, New South Wales

A giant koala outside the Oliver's Real Food highway stop at Gundagai, near the Dog on the Tuckerbox precinct.

Roadside giants

69 km away

✓ Recommended arrival recorded

TRANSPARENCY

Sources & research

Canoli the Cocky

Land of the Bigs · recorded 2026-08-22

Community

Wagga Wagga Botanic Gardens

NSW Government · recorded 2026-08-22

Government

Wagga Wagga Zoo & Aviary

Wagga Wagga City Council · recorded 2026-08-22

Government

What we're still checking

Open-licence image search completed 24 August 2026. No defensible reusable image with file-level commercial-use provenance was verified in the completed Commons, government/open-licence and archival/open-collection sweep.

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