Along the east coast of Australia, a great journey unfolds each year in the ocean’s deep blue heart; the migration of the humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae). From the cold, nutrient-rich waters of Antarctica, these whales begin a long and ancient voyage, swimming thousands of kilometers northward toward the warm breeding grounds of the Great Barrier Reef and subtropical seas near northern Queensland.
This migration, beginning in late autumn and continuing through winter into spring does not go unnoticed by Country.
As the whale’s breach and sing their stories through the salt-laced air, something stirs on the land too. The Golden Wattle (Acacia pycnantha), with its soft, sunlit blossoms, begins to bloom. This golden firework of color brightens the bushland, signaling more than just a change in season, it is a messenger of movement, of life, of time turning. To many First Peoples across Australia, plants and their flowering are part of an intricate calendar of indicators. These are signs from Country that tell of cycles beyond the human messages encoded in bark, bud, and birdcall. When the wattle blooms, it whispers: the whales are coming.
Indigenous knowledge, passed down through tens of thousands of years, is deeply attuned to these connections between flora and fauna. For First Peoples, the flowering of plants is not merely aesthetic; it is ecological language. Wattle flowers, for example, are a seasonal marker that aligns with the northward migration of whales — the time when female whales, heavy with unborn calves, travel to the warmer waters where birthing is safer and gentler for the newborns.
These whales are not just travelling , they are seeking continuation, the sacred act of bringing life into the world. Once in northern waters, the females give birth, nurse their calves, and rest before making the return journey south later in the year. This southward migration, seen in spring and early summer, often includes playful, curious calves, shadowing their mothers and learning the rhythms of the sea.
The return of the whales is also marked by changes on land. Other wattles bloom in succession, and a kaleidoscope of flowers and animal behaviors signal spring’s fullness. The bush tells its own version of the story, the land and sea echoing each other.
This is deep time ecology, a way of knowing that sees no division between the land, the sea, the sky, and the beings within them. It is about relational knowledge, knowing when the eels are moving by the flowering of certain trees, or when the bogong moths arrive with the mountain snows, or when the whales breach in rhythm with the golden fire of wattle and native hibiscus flowers.
To see the whales migrating is to witness kin returning, not merely as spectacle, but as sacred continuity. Their song, resonant and ancient, mirrors the songlines that trace the land, invisible threads that map not just geography but belonging, culture, and time itself.
The blooming of the Golden Wattle is more than beauty, it is a signpost in a world of signs, a marker that tells us: life is moving, birth is near, kin are coming home. In this dance between plant and animal, sea and sky, lies an ecological poetry one that speaks to the heart of sustainability. Plants and animals speak to each other, and to us; if we learn to listen.
Through the Indigenous lens, we are not observers, but participants.
The cycles of the whales, the flowering of the wattles and Native Hibiscus— these are not events outside of us, but part of the great, breathing whole that is Country.
