The Bonney Upwelling System, spanning the shelf waters between Cape Otway, Victoria, and Kangaroo Island in South Australia, is widely considered the most productive subsystem within the broader Great Southern Australian Coastal Upwelling System (GSACUS). Despite holding global importance as a seasonal feeding ground for the pygmy blue whale (PBW), observational studies linking upwelling variability to ecological function, such as prey field dynamics, remain limited. Such studies require robust methods to transform oceanographic field data into ecologically meaningful metrics. This study describes the development and implementation of upwelling indices derived from Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) datasets to quantify spatiotemporal features of the Bonney Upwelling System. We provide a case study of the anomalously strong 2023/24 upwelling season using typical wind and mooring based indices, along with a new approach to automate the spatiotemporal mapping of the surface plume from satellite imagery. Coupled with preliminary findings from vessel-based oceanographic and zooplankton surveys, we discuss the potential implications of extreme upwelling on coastal krill, the primary food source for PBW's in the Bonney Upwelling System.