From Obsession to Success: A Saskatchewan Man’s Journey of Bird Carving

Cam Merkle poses with his carvings and photographs at Maple and Bass in Martensville, Sask., on Aug. 7, 2025. The carving to his right is of a small flock of Carolina parakeets, a bird that has been extinct for over a century. Meghan Lett/The Epoch Times

MARTENSVILLE, Sask.—Cam Merkle doesn’t quite know what compels him to carve. But he does know where it began—in the summer of 1982, when he walked into the Wascana Centre in Regina, Sask., and saw three carvings of birds.

“As soon as I saw those carvings, some kind of a switch just flipped in me,” Merkle told The Epoch Times.