Wilson Inlet is a shallow, seasonally open estuary located on the coast of the Great Southern region of Western Australia. Description The inlet receives water from the two main rivers: the Denmark River and the Hay River 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. The inlet is a wave 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 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 Denmark and the City of Albany. The inlet discharges through Nullaki Point at the eastern end of Ocean Beach into the Southern Ocean at Ratcliffe Bay when the sandbar is open. The Wilson Inlet bar is sometimes breached by the Water Corporation at Ocean Beach near Denmark. The low lying land adjacent to the inlet consists of swamps with lakes to the east. The silt beds in the area indicate that it was of recent estuarine origin. The majority of the catchment is contained within the Albany-Fraser geological province with the original granite overlaid with sands and laterite deposited in the Quaternary period. History The inlet was formed 6000–8000 years ago when rising sea levels led to an ancient river valley being flooded. The original human inhabitants of the inlet and surrounds were Aboriginal Australian people, the Noongar. Many Aboriginal artefacts have been found in the area, including fish traps, corroboree sites, ochre excavation site and campsites. The Noongar 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. The inlet was named after Wilson by Governor Stirling. The first Europeans to settle in the catchment area were the Randall and Young families in the 1890s. Timber mills were constructed in 1895, land clearing began