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Climate and Landscape

In the Tropics Landscape Stories Coping with Change

In the Tropics

Landscape

The Top End coastline is backed by landscapes of generally low relief, seldom reaching elevations exceeding 30m.

Further from the coast, plains rise slowly in height towards the south. The most significant departures from this general pattern involve areas of rugged sandstone plateau, the most significant extending from Kakadu National Park south-eastwards through Arnhem Land.

Top End wetlands are concentrated in the areas of low relief near the northern coast. They are some of the most extensive and remote wetlands in Australia and compared to those in southern Australia are generally in good condition.

Closer to the coast there are large mangrove swamps, salt marshes and seagrass beds, while major river systems have freshwater floodplains, covering thousands of square kilometres. These have permanent or seasonal swamps and can be dry or under several metres of water, depending on the season. They are home to large numbers of waterbirds, fish, mammals and reptiles, and are still widely used by Aboriginal people.

The Australian land mass has been subject to dramatic and dynamic changes over the past 20,000 years.

About 18,000 years ago, the wetlands of Kakadu National Park were at the northern edge of the desert zone and sandstone outcrops like Ubirr and Nourlangie, which now overlook Kakadu's wetlands, were drier inland sites.

Today, standing on the rim of the escarpment around the Arafura Swamp in Central Arnhem Land, you look out over the largest paperbark swamp in northern Australia. There is nothing in the visible landscape to suggest that much of this vast freshwater wetland used to be a large saltwater estuary associated with tidal creeks fringed by mangrove.

Stories

There are stories, in both secular and sacred Aboriginal tradition, which refer to those dramatic changes and show the depth of Aboriginal cultural continuity along the dynamic northern coastline.

Contemporary science reinforces the likelihood that these stories refer to real situations from thousands of years in the past:

		inhabited islands, which no longer exist, some 60 kilometres off the central Arnhem Land coast;
		the disappearance of large freshwater swamps under the sea;
		the separation of a larger island mass into two halves

- these are but a few such stories.

Coping with Change

Accepting the evidence for cultural continuity and the speed of coastal change makes you realise the ability and capacity of the Aboriginal nations of the ancient coasts to respond to change.

Look at rock art. It shows how Aboriginal technology has changed in parallel to these geographical changes and demonstrates the capacity to respond rapidly to dramatic change in the landscape affecting huge areas.

For more information on the Top End's climate and landscape, visit: www.savanna.ntu.edu.au