Wilson Inlet is a shallow, seasonally open

estuary An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime environment ...

located on the coast of the Great Southern region of

Western Australia Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to th ...

Description

The inlet receives water from the two main rivers: the

Denmark River The Denmark River is located in the Great Southern region of Western Australia. The river rises near Pardelup and meanders in a southerly direction until it flows through Denmark into Wilson Inlet (along with the Hay River). The traditional ...

and the

Hay River Hay River may refer to: Places * Hay River, Northwest Territories * Hay River, Wisconsin Rivers * Hay River (Wisconsin) * Hay River (Canada), a river in Alberta and Northwest Territories, Canada * Hay River, Northern Territory, Australia * Hay R ...

and some smaller rivers and streams such as the Sleeman River, Little River and Cuppup Creek. It is located south east of the town of

Denmark ) , song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast") , song_type = National and royal anthem , image_map = EU-Denmark.svg , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark ...

. The inlet is a

wave In physics, mathematics, and related fields, a wave is a propagating dynamic disturbance (change from equilibrium) of one or more quantities. Waves can be periodic, in which case those quantities oscillate repeatedly about an equilibrium (res ...

dominated estuary with an opening mouth that has a width of with a bar blocking it from late January to August. The inlet is separated into two basins, the eastern and western basin. The estuary is situated on a narrow coastal plain between

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies undergro ...

hills to the north and the west and the coastal dunes to the south. The area of the inlet is and it has an average depth of ; its deepest point is . The inlet is long from east to west and has a width of The inlet has a total catchment area of covering parts of the

Shire of Plantagenet The Shire of Plantagenet is a local government area in the Great Southern region of Western Australia, managed from the town of Mount Barker, south of Perth and north of Albany. The shire covers an area of and includes the communities of ...

, the

Shire of Denmark The Shire of Denmark is a local government area in the Great Southern region of Western Australia, about west of Albany and about south-southeast of the state capital, Perth. The Shire of Denmark covers an area of , and its seat of governm ...

and the

City of Albany The City of Albany is a local government area in the Great Southern region of Western Australia, about south-southeast of Perth, the capital of Western Australia. It covers an area of , including the Greater Albany metropolitan area and the ...

. The inlet discharges through Nullaki Point at the eastern end of Ocean Beach into the

Southern Ocean The Southern Ocean, also known as the Antarctic Ocean, comprises the southernmost waters of the World Ocean, generally taken to be south of 60° S latitude and encircling Antarctica. With a size of , it is regarded as the second-small ...

at Ratcliffe Bay when the sandbar is open. The Wilson Inlet bar is sometimes breached by the

Water Corporation Water Corporation is the principal supplier of water, wastewater and drainage services throughout the state of Western Australia. It is the seventh successive agency to deal with the services in Perth, Western Australia. With offices in Perth ...

at Ocean Beach near Denmark. The low lying land adjacent to the inlet consists of

swamp A swamp is a forested wetland.Keddy, P.A. 2010. Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (2nd edition). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. 497 p. Swamps are considered to be transition zones because both land and water play a role in ...

s with lakes to the east. The

silt Silt is granular material of a size between sand and clay and composed mostly of broken grains of quartz. Silt may occur as a soil (often mixed with sand or clay) or as sediment mixed in suspension with water. Silt usually has a floury feel when ...

beds in the area indicate that it was of recent

estuarine An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime environment ...

origin. The majority of the catchment is contained within the Albany-Fraser geological province with the original granite overlaid with sands and

laterite Laterite is both a soil and a rock type rich in iron and aluminium and is commonly considered to have formed in hot and wet tropical areas. Nearly all laterites are of rusty-red coloration, because of high iron oxide content. They develop by ...

deposited in the

Quaternary The Quaternary ( ) is the current and most recent of the three periods of the Cenozoic Era in the geologic time scale of the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS). It follows the Neogene Period and spans from 2.58 million years ...

period.

History

The inlet was formed 6000–8000 years ago when rising sea levels led to an ancient

river valley A valley is an elongated low area often running between hills or mountains, which will typically contain a river or stream running from one end to the other. Most valleys are formed by erosion of the land surface by rivers or streams over ...

being flooded. The original human inhabitants of the inlet and surrounds were

Aboriginal Australian Aboriginal Australians are the various Indigenous peoples of the Australian mainland and many of its islands, such as Tasmania, Fraser Island, Hinchinbrook Island, the Tiwi Islands, and Groote Eylandt, but excluding the Torres Strait Islands ...

people, the

Noongar The Noongar (, also spelt Noongah, Nyungar , Nyoongar, Nyoongah, Nyungah, Nyugah, and Yunga ) are Aboriginal Australian peoples who live in the south-west corner of Western Australia, from Geraldton on the west coast to Esperance on the so ...

. Many Aboriginal artefacts have been found in the area, including

fish trap A fish trap is a trap used for fishing. Fish traps include fishing weirs, lobster traps, and some fishing nets such as fyke nets. Traps are culturally almost universal and seem to have been independently invented many times. There are two main ...

corroboree A corroboree is a generic word for a meeting of Australian Aboriginal peoples. It may be a sacred ceremony, a festive celebration, or of a warlike character. A word coined by the first British settlers in the Sydney area from a word in the l ...

sites,

ochre Ochre ( ; , ), or ocher in American English, is a natural clay earth pigment, a mixture of ferric oxide and varying amounts of clay and sand. It ranges in colour from yellow to deep orange or brown. It is also the name of the colours produced ...

excavation site and campsites. The

name for the inlet is ''Koorabup'', which means ''Place of the Black Swan''. The area was visited by Dr Thomas Wilson in his 1829 expedition from

King George Sound King George Sound ( nys , Menang Koort) is a sound on the south coast of Western Australia. Named King George the Third's Sound in 1791, it was referred to as King George's Sound from 1805. The name "King George Sound" gradually came into use ...

. The inlet was named after Wilson by

Governor Stirling A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political r ...

. The first Europeans to settle in the catchment area were the Randall and Young families in the 1890s.

Timber mill A sawmill (saw mill, saw-mill) or lumber mill is a facility where logs are cut into lumber. Modern sawmills use a motorized saw to cut logs lengthwise to make long pieces, and crosswise to length depending on standard or custom sizes (dimensi ...

s were constructed in 1895, land clearing began in the 1920s, and by 1982 46% of the catchment was privately owned. In total 44% of the catchment has been cleared and 38% remains as

forest A forest is an area of land dominated by trees. Hundreds of definitions of forest are used throughout the world, incorporating factors such as tree density, tree height, land use, legal standing, and ecological function. The United Nations' ...

and

national park A national park is a nature park, natural park in use for conservation (ethic), conservation purposes, created and protected by national governments. Often it is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state dec ...

s. In 1911 a local farmer William Leonard Smeed and six members of his family (four adults and three children), were drowned when their small yacht ''Little Wonder'' was knocked down in a squall while sailing on the inlet near Pelican Island. The inlet is breached at Ocean Beach near Denmark at times to reduce the chances of flooding around the local river systems. The bar was breached in 2014, 2017, 2018 and again in 2020.

Flora

The mouth of the inlet is dominated by stands of rushes (

Juncaceae Juncaceae is a family of flowering plants, commonly known as the rush family. It consists of 8 genera and about 464 known species of slow-growing, rhizomatous, herbaceous monocotyledonous plants that may superficially resemble grasses and s ...

) of a single species, the South African '' Juncus kraussi''. ''

Melaleuca cuticularis ''Melaleuca cuticularis'', commonly known as the saltwater paperbark is a tree in the myrtle family, Myrtaceae and is native to the south-west of Western Australia. There is also a disjunct population on Kangaroo Island in South Australia. It i ...

'', a salt tolerant

paperbark ''Melaleuca'' () is a genus of nearly 300 species of plants in the myrtle family, Myrtaceae, commonly known as paperbarks, honey-myrtles or tea-trees (although the last name is also applied to species of ''Leptospermum''). They range in size f ...

, also fringes the inlet and follows the channels, and is present in the tidal parts of the rivers. The salt marsh is predominantly made up of '' Juncus kraussi'', ''

Sarcocornia quinqueflora ''Salicornia quinqueflora'', Synonym (taxonomy), synonym ''Sarcocornia quinqueflora'', commonly known as beaded samphire, bead weed, beaded glasswort or glasswort, is a species of succulent halophytic coastal shrub. It occurs in wetter coastal ar ...

'', and ''

Samolus repens ''Samolus repens'' is a species of water pimpernel native to Australia, New Zealand and near-by Pacific islands, and South America (South Chile), where it is common in temperate and subtropic coastlines. Common names include creeping brookweed a ...

''.

Fauna

Recreational fishing is popular within the inlet, which many species of fish inhabit, including

cobbler Cobbler(s) may refer to: *A person who repairs, and sometimes makes, shoes Places * The Cobbler, a mountain located near the head of Loch Long in Scotland * Mount Cobbler, Australia Art, entertainment and media * ''The Cobbler'' (1923 film) ...

King George whiting The King George whiting (''Sillaginodes punctatus''), also known as the spotted whiting or spotted sillago, is a coastal marine fish of the smelt-whitings family Sillaginidae. The King George whiting is endemic to Australia, inhabiting the so ...

tailor A tailor is a person who makes or alters clothing, particularly in men's clothing. The Oxford English Dictionary dates the term to the thirteenth century. History Although clothing construction goes back to prehistory, there is evidence of ...

, mullet, salmon trout and flathead. Other fish found in the estuary include sandy sprat, yellow eye mullet,

sea mullet The flathead grey mullet (''Mugil cephalus'') is an important food fish species in the mullet family Mugilidae. It is found in coastal tropical and subtropical waters worldwide. Its length is typically . It is known with numerous English names ...

and

blue mackerel The blue mackerel (''Scomber australasicus''), also called Japanese mackerel, Pacific mackerel, slimy mackerel or spotted chub mackerel, is a fish of the family Scombridae, found in tropical and subtropical waters of the Pacific Ocean from Japa ...

. Wilson Inlet is a key nursery for many juvenile fish species especially

pink snapper The Australasian snapper (''Chrysophrys auratus'') or silver seabream is a species of porgie found in coastal waters of Australia, Philippines, Indonesia, mainland China, Taiwan, Japan and New Zealand. Its distribution areas in the Northern an ...

that migrate from the inlet to mature in the greater oceanic breeding stock. Because of this the size of pink snapper that could be removed from the inlet was raised from to in July 2007. Many waterbird species inhabit the inlet and its surrounds, including the

silver gull The silver gull (''Chroicocephalus novaehollandiae'') is the most common gull of Australia. It has been found throughout the continent, but particularly at or near coastal areas. It is smaller than the Pacific gull (''Larus pacificus''), which ...

Australian pelican The Australian pelican (''Pelecanus conspicillatus'') is a large waterbird in the family Pelecanidae, widespread on the inland and coastal waters of Australia and New Guinea, also in Fiji, parts of Indonesia and as a vagrant in New Zealand. It ...

black swan The black swan (''Cygnus atratus'') is a large waterbird, a species of swan which breeds mainly in the southeast and southwest regions of Australia. Within Australia, the black swan is nomadic, with erratic migration patterns dependent upon c ...

little black cormorant The little black cormorant (''Phalacrocorax sulcirostris'') is a member of the cormorant family of seabirds. It is common in smaller rivers and lakes throughout most areas of Australia and northern New Zealand, where it is known as the little bl ...

red-necked stint The red-necked stint (''Calidris ruficollis'') is a small migratory wader. The genus name is from Ancient Greek ''kalidris'' or ''skalidris'', a term used by Aristotle for some grey-coloured waterside birds. The specific ''ruficollis'' is from La ...

little pied cormorant The little pied cormorant, little shag or kawaupaka (''Microcarbo melanoleucos'') is a common Australasian waterbird, found around the coasts, islands, estuaries, and inland waters of Australia, New Guinea, New Zealand, Thailand, Myanmar, Singapo ...

grey teal The grey teal (''Anas gracilis'') is a dabbling duck found in open wetlands in Australia and New Zealand. Description It can be identified due to the presence of a crimson coloured iris in its eyes.Winter, M. (2018). Grey Teal. Wilderness Mag ...

red-necked avocet The red-necked avocet (''Recurvirostra novaehollandiae'') also known as the Australian avocet, cobbler, cobbler's awl, and painted lady, is a wader of the family Recurvirostridae that is endemic to Australia and is fairly common and widespread th ...

blue-billed duck The blue-billed duck (''Oxyura australis'') is a small Australian stiff-tailed duck, with both the male and female growing to a length of 40 cm (16 in). The male has a slate-blue bill which changes to bright-blue during the breeding sea ...

and the

Australasian shoveller The Australasian shoveler (''Spatula rhynchotis'') is a species of dabbling duck in the genus ''Spatula''. It ranges from 46 to 53 cm. It lives in heavily vegetated swamps. In Australia it is protected under the National Parks and Wildli ...

. 22 species of migratory shorebird have been recorded. The inlet is home to a mussel and oyster farm that was established in 2002. The farm operates on a lease on the south side of the inlet and completed its first harvest in 2005–2006.

Blue mussel The blue mussel (''Mytilus edulis''), also known as the common mussel, is a medium-sized edible marine (ocean), marine bivalve mollusc in the family (biology), family Mytilidae, the mussels. Blue mussels are subject to commercial use and intensiv ...

s are produced using a longline cultivation technique.

Belon oyster ''Ostrea edulis'', commonly known as the European flat oyster, is a species of oyster native to Europe. In Britain and Ireland, regional names include Colchester native oyster, mud oyster, or edible oyster. In France, ''Ostrea edulis'' are known ...

s are cultivated using a similar technique. An earlier operation had attempted to commercially produce blue mussels in the 1970s, but the small scale raft culture was destroyed by

Cyclone Alby Severe Tropical Cyclone Alby was regarded as the most devastating tropical cyclone to impact southwestern Western Australia on record. Forming out of an area of low pressure on 27 March 1978, Alby steadily developed as it tracked southwestward, p ...

just prior to harvest.

External links

Wilson Inlet Tourism
*

References

{{coord, 34, 59, 43, S, 117, 24, 42, E, region:AU-WA, display=title Great Southern (Western Australia) Inlets of Western Australia South coast of Western Australia