Rug up for Makuru in the South West, where the swans are flirting and the streams are gushing
Feature by Carolyn Beasley
Along the South West waterways, pairs of black swans are honking and whistling, slender necks bending and bowing as they court their life-long partners. It’s the Noongar Aboriginal season of Makuru, the cold and rainy season, when both male and female swans are working hard. Gathering beak-loads of grasses and rushes, they construct a large, messy mound, a cosy nest for their pending eggs.
For Lesley Ugle, tour guide for Boola Bidi Dreaming in Harvey, the swan breeding time is part of nature’s annual rhythm. She says the season of Makuru in the South West (which usually coincides with June and July) has many charms, and it’s a great time to rug up and cast a line in the river or Harvey Dam.
Boola Bidi Dreaming, Kaatdijin Bidi Trail
“I still do it today,” Lesley says. “I take my grandchildren and my great-grandchildren out fishing.”
Lesley explains that the fat rainbow trout are delicious during Makuru. It’s also a great season for freshwater mussels, and in years gone by these were easy to catch.
“When I was a kid growing up, they were growing like a line of beads on the bottom of the river bed,” Lesley explains. “Sometimes we’d also go for gilgies (a small freshwater crayfish), it's in the banks of the river. That was something that myself and my cousins used
to do, back in the day.”
In even older times, Makuru would see Lesley’s ancestors of the Bindjareb Noongar nation seeking shelter inland, in the higher caves of the Darling Range.
“Up there, they had the caves for security, for warmth, and to light their fires,” Lesley says. “As they saw the weather warming up, then they'd come down towards the ocean.”
Boola Bidi Dreaming, Ridge Tour
The rains of Makuru would plump up the river systems, much to the delight of excited ducks. The rain would kickstart the grasses native to the Harvey region, fattening the kangaroos. Not only were the kangaroos an important source of protein, their skins were vital in this chilly weather. Makuru was an important season for gathering the skins, or bookas, to be worn as a cloak.
Lesley explains that the season of Makuru also had a distinctive smell, an intensifying aroma of native peppermint (or wonil) leaves, as pale grey smoke wafted on the breeze. Makuru is the favoured time for cultural burning, with less risk of bushfires.
“This is our smoking and burning time along the riverways,” Lesley explains. “The smoke is also healing the plants and the water sources, but also the animals. All of that is connected.”
These days, Lesley and others from the Harvey Aboriginal Corporation are still conducting cool burning around the Harvey River, and a new area at Myalup.
“We have to remember that our cool burning stopped for a long, long time, for over 100 years, and just about now we're starting to bring it back in, getting more people trained up for it.”
Boola Bidi Dreaming
Importantly, valuable cultural lessons like these were passed through Lesley’s family.
“I've been listening to my father for over 60 years,” she says, and now, each Makuru season, she’s passing the knowledge on.
Visitors on Lesley’s tours will learn about the many bush medicines available in the wilds of the South West. One is particularly useful in the winter months of Makuru.
“We call it the ‘rubbing stuff’,” Lesley laughs. “People use Dencorub, Vicks, Deep Heat and all that. We use emu fat, together with eucalyptus and bracken ferns.”
Lesley says the best time to get the young eucalyptus leaves for this decongestant and anti-inflammatory ointment is in spring, when the leaves are young. But the time to put it all together? That’s in Makuru.
For those joining Lesley’s tours there’s a choice of a one-hour stroll, the Noongar Kaatdjin Bidi - Noongar Knowledge River Path that winds gently along the restored Harvey River, taking in art works of the six Noongar seasons. Alternatively, the Ridge Walking Tour provides a two-hour cultural immersion, with sweeping views of the Harvey Dam backwaters.
Both tours bring the seasonal cycles and their cultural significance to life, in the unique and nature-rich South West.
Brad Vitale, Boola Bidi Dreaming
Published June 2025.