Macumba Station, often just called Macumba, is a

pastoral lease A pastoral lease, sometimes called a pastoral run, is an arrangement used in both Australia and New Zealand where government-owned Crown land is leased out to Pastoral farming, graziers for the purpose of livestock grazing on rangelands. Austral ...

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...

currently operating as a

cattle station In Australia and New Zealand, a cattle station is a large farm ( station is equivalent to the American ranch), the main activity of which is the rearing of cattle. The owner of a cattle station is called a '' grazier''. The largest cattle stati ...

Description

Macumba is located about north east of

Oodnadatta Oodnadatta is a small, remote outback town and locality in the Australian state of South Australia, located north-north-west of the state capital of Adelaide city centre, Adelaide by road or direct, at an altitude of . The unsealed Oodnadatta ...

and east of

Marla Marla is a town and locality in the Australian state of South Australia located in the state's north-west about north-west of the state capital of Adelaide and about south of the town of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory. History Marla ...

in the state of

, The station occupies an area of and is the third largest station in South Australia after

Anna Creek station Anna Creek Station is the world's largest working cattle station. It is located in the Australian state of South Australia. Description Anna Creek Station has an area of . It is larger than its nearest rival, Alexandria Station (Northern Ter ...

and

Innamincka Station Innamincka Station, often called simply Innamincka, is a pastoral lease in the Australian state of South Australia. It operates as a cattle station. It is located about north-east of the small Township#Australia, township of Innamincka, S ...

. Macumba was owned by the pastoral company S. Kidman & Co. until 2016, when a deal was finalised for its purchase by joint venture company, Australian Outback Beef. The company is owned by Gina Reinhart (who holds a 2/3 stake) a China's Shanghai CRED (which holds the remaining 1/3). The station contains a range of terrains including sandhills, mulga woodland, watercourses with

redgum Redgum were an Australian bush band, folk and political music group formed in Adelaide in 1975 by singer-songwriters John Schumann and Michael Atkinson (composer), Michael Atkinson on guitars/vocals, and Verity Truman on flute/vocals; they were ...

s and areas of desert and

gibber A desert pavement, also called reg (in western Sahara), serir (in eastern Sahara), gibber (in Australia), or saï (in central Asia) is a desert surface covered with closely packed, interlocking angular or rounded rock fragments of pebble and c ...

plain. Watercourses crossing the property include the Macumba River, Stevenson Creek and Alberga Creek, each having several waterholes some of which are almost permanent, except in times of prolonged drought. Willow Bore, which was sunk by the government prior to 1892, can provide per day, enough to support 2,000 head of cattle.

History

Established prior to 1883 the station at that time was owned by

Young Young may refer to: * Offspring, the product of reproduction of a new organism produced by one or more parents * Youth, the time of life when one's age is low, often meaning the time between childhood and adulthood Music * The Young, an America ...

and Belt. In 1883 the surrounding area had been flooded and all the waterholes and creeks were filled. A man named Millard became lost in the desert country of the station in 1884, and on finding the

telegraph line Electrical telegraphy is point-to-point distance communicating via sending electric signals over wire, a system primarily used from the 1840s until the late 20th century. It was the first electrical telecommunications system and the most wide ...

he burned down a pole and cut the wire to draw attention to his plight. The transcontinental telegraph line was out of service for several days and Millard's body along with the bodies of both his horses were found when repair crews reached the breakage. In 1887 the station was owned by Messrs Chambers and Polhill who operated a store and ran a mail service out to Peake and surrounding areas as far as

Alice Springs Alice Springs () is a town in the Northern Territory, Australia; it is the third-largest settlement after Darwin, Northern Territory, Darwin and Palmerston, Northern Territory, Palmerston. The name Alice Springs was given by surveyor William ...

. The area had been flooded in the recent past as ''the old Macumba Station had been abandoned in consequence of the frequent floods''. The station was managed by Joseph Albert Breaden in the late 1880s and early 1890s but he left to join Carr Boyd in his expedition from Warrina to

Western Australia Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...

. In the December 1888 George Bennet, who was acting as station manager, and his second son Albert Francis Bennet (1874–1888) died at the station while working with a mob of cattle in extremely hot weather, though the circumstances remained something of a mystery. His elder son, also named George Bennet (1870–1928), was later well-known as a pastoralist and racehorse owner. Alexander W. T. Grant-Thorold and Henry L'Estrange, trading as "Grant & Stokes" acquired the property previous to 1889 when they took delivery of 500 bullocks for the station and then sold off 1,000 in 1890, followed by another 2,500 in 1891. Cattle stealing was a problem at Macumba in 1891 with two cases being heard in court. George Bishop, Arthur Hutchinson and Thomas Bennett were all charged with stealing and although Bennett was acquitted the other two were found guilty and sentenced to two years

hard labour Penal labour is a term for various kinds of forced labour that prisoners are required to perform, typically manual labour. The work may be light or hard, depending on the context. Forms of sentence involving penal labour have included inv ...

. Another man, Job Hobbs, was also charged with stealing cattle from Macumba. The partnership Grant & Stokes was dissolved in 1893 and Macumba was sold to John Waterstion, who also bought the two other properties owned by the pair, Glen Helen and Idracowra along with the 15,000 cattle stocked on the properties. All the properties had been in the grip of a prolonged

drought A drought is a period of drier-than-normal conditions.Douville, H., K. Raghavan, J. Renwick, R.P. Allan, P.A. Arias, M. Barlow, R. Cerezo-Mota, A. Cherchi, T.Y. Gan, J. Gergis, D. Jiang, A. Khan, W. Pokam Mba, D. Rosenfeld, J. Tierney, ...

from 1892–1893 and it was estimated that Macumba alone had lost 1,000 head of cattle from thirst when all the waterholes and creeks had dried up. The property was flooded in 1903 when the Stevenson Creek rose suddenly following heavy rain upstream. Members of a

prospecting Prospecting is the first stage of the geological analysis (followed by Mining engineering#Pre-mining, exploration) of a territory. It is the search for minerals, fossils, precious metals, or mineral specimens. It is also known as fossicking. ...

syndicate were stranded for four days waiting to cross the creek when the waters started to subside. W. R. Cave took over at Macumba prior to 1905 and sold 40 bullocks at market in May of that year. The station manager at the time was Mr Smart.

Sidney Kidman Sir Sidney Kidman (9 May 18572 September 1935), known as Sid Kidman and popularly named "the Cattle King", was an Australian pastoralist and entrepreneur who owned or co-owned large areas of land in Australia in his lifetime. Early life Sidne ...

acquired Macumba in 1905, most likely in September, and he started moving

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 mi ...

s off the property to Warrina then trucked them to the

Kapunda Kapunda is a town on the Light River near the Barossa Valley in South Australia. It was established after a discovery in 1842 of significant copper deposits. The population was 2,917 at the 2016 Australian census. The southern entrance to th ...

horse sales. Kidman visited the property in December 1905 for an inspection with his partner, Mr Bartlett, finding the run to be in ''splendid condition''. In 1908 massive floods caused a huge tract of land long and the same width including parts of Macumba and neighbouring Dalhousie Station to be submerged following heavy rains in the area. Nearby Todmorden Station recorded a fall of in a 24-hour period. When a second bore was sunk at the station in 1909, a good supply of

artesian water An artesian well is a well that brings groundwater to the surface without pumping because it is under pressure within a body of rock or sediment known as an aquifer. When trapped water in an aquifer is surrounded by layers of impermeable roc ...

was struck at a depth of giving a supply of per day. By 1917 a fifth bore was being planned and Macumba was considered one of the best watered runs in the north. The area suffered a time of

for a period of three years from 1928–1931 when the rains finally came. In 1931 there were few cattle left in the district, but there were also few

vermin Vermin (colloquially varmint(s) or varmit(s)) are pests or nuisance animals that spread diseases and destroy crops, livestock, and property. Since the term is defined in relation to human activities, which species are included vary by regi ...

such as

rabbit Rabbits are small mammals in the family Leporidae (which also includes the hares), which is in the order Lagomorpha (which also includes pikas). They are familiar throughout the world as a small herbivore, a prey animal, a domesticated ...

s and

wild dog A free-ranging dog is a dog that is not confined to a yard or house. Free-ranging dogs include street dogs, village dogs, stray dogs, feral dogs, etc., and may be owned or unowned. The global dog population is estimated to be 900 million, of whi ...

s remaining either. After more good follow-up rains the summer was still very hot in 1932 with an average temperature of being recorded for 50 days. Severe floods swept through much of

Central Australia Central Australia, also sometimes referred to as the Red Centre, is an inexactly defined region associated with the geographic centre of Australia. In its narrowest sense it describes a region that is limited to the town of Alice Springs and ...

in early 1939. The ''pigsty'' bridge (a temporary bridge supported on piers consisting of sleepers built in sections of four) over Stevenson Creek was swept away, railway services were disrupted for weeks with parts of the railway line washed away, telegraph poles were toppled and the crossing at Alberga Creek was destroyed. R. M. Williams worked at Macumba shortly after World War II transporting

brumbies The ACT Brumbies (known from 2005 to 2022 as simply the Brumbies) is an Australian professional rugby union team based in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory (ACT), The team competes in Super Rugby and named for the feral horses which inh ...

to use as bucking stock at the Marrabel

Rodeo Rodeo () is a competitive equestrian sport that arose out of the working practices of cattle herding in Spain and Mexico, expanding throughout the Americas and to other nations. It was originally based on the skills required of the working vaqu ...

. More floods hit the station in 1950 when of rain fell in just 48 hours. The creek near the homestead was swollen to wide with some livestock being lost when they were washed downstream. Macumba had virtually no rain over a period of 14 months until June 2004 when the area received over the course of 10 days. The country had begun to produce fresh feed and had green growth carpeting the plains, which would keep the stock going until the end of summer. Eddie Nunn was the manager of Macumba in 2004. Macumba had to be completely destocked in 2008 following a severe and prolonged drought in the area. The land occupying the extent of the Macumba pastoral lease was gazetted as a locality by the Government of South Australia on 26 April 2013 under the name 'Macumba'.

References

{{Stations of Sidney Kidman Far North (South Australia) Stations in South Australia

Description

History

See also

References