Muttaburrasaurus langdoni

Muttaburrasaurus langdoni was a large mid-Cretaceous ornithopod from Queensland. The holotype preserves an almost complete skull and much of the skeleton, making it one of Australia's most informative dinosaurs. A major 2026 revision combined newly recovered bones from the original quarry with CT scans and digital reconstruction. It showed that the famous swollen muzzle was assembled differently from older restorations and that the front of the upper jaw retained five small teeth on each side. Its exact family position remains unresolved: the safest broad placement is Ornithopoda, while traditional iguanodontian and newer elasmarian interpretations require further testing.

Its fossils occur between approximately 96.3 and 93.5 million years ago. Values shown here are approximate and reflect the current curated seed dataset.

The skull had a deep rounded muzzle formed by expanded bones around the nostrils, strong jaw-closing musculature and large shearing cheek teeth. Newly identified premaxillary teeth show that the front of the mouth was not completely toothless. CT-based reconstructions indicate large olfactory bulbs, broad sideways visual fields and hearing best suited to relatively low frequencies. Its powerful hind limbs and shorter but robust forelimbs support facultative bipedalism: it could move and feed on all fours while retaining the ability to stand or travel on two legs.

• Inflated rounded muzzle surrounding large nasal passages
• Five small premaxillary teeth on each side of the upper jaw
• Large shearing cheek teeth replaced in a wave-like sequence
• Strong jaw muscles and a deep lower jaw
• Large olfactory bulbs associated with a strong sense of smell
• Forelimbs capable of supporting quadrupedal movement

Grazier Doug Langdon noticed fossil bones at Rosebery Downs near Muttaburra in 1963. Queensland Museum staff recovered the scattered skeleton from the bank of the Thomson River, and Alan Bartholomai and Ralph Molnar named Muttaburrasaurus langdoni in 1981. The holotype is QM F6140. A second skull from Dunluce Station near Hughenden and other isolated remains expanded the record. Newly recognised fragments associated with the holotype, CT imaging and renewed study of the type locality helped complete the 2026 reconstruction.

Discovery credit: Doug Langdon, Queensland Museum field team.

Naming authors: Alan Bartholomai, Ralph E. Molnar.

The type skeleton was buried in marine mud of the Mackunda Formation after the carcass probably washed from a nearby coastal plain into the Eromanga Sea. On land, Muttaburrasaurus would have inhabited conifer, cycad and fern vegetation along rivers and low coastal terrain. The fossil's marine burial environment is therefore not the same as the habitat in which the animal spent most of its life.

The revised jaws support selective browsing on resistant vegetation rather than the older idea of a simple cropping beak. Small front teeth may have helped strip cones or other tough food, and occasional invertebrate feeding is possible, but direct gut contents are unknown. Digital brain and inner-ear models suggest strong smell, limited binocular overlap and sensitivity to lower-frequency sounds. None of these features establishes herd structure or a specific call.

• Muttaburrasaurus is Queensland's official fossil emblem.
• Its holotype is roughly sixty percent complete and includes an almost complete skull.
• Previously unrecognised skull pieces and CT scans transformed the 2026 reconstruction.
• The 2026 reconstruction found small teeth at the very front of the upper jaw.

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1. 01
   Muttaburrasaurus, a new iguanodontid (Ornithischia: Ornithopoda) dinosaur from the Lower Cretaceous of Queensland

   Alan Bartholomai, Ralph E. Molnar · Memoirs of the Queensland Museum 20 · 1981

   Open source
2. 02
   Cranial anatomy, palaeoneurology, palaeobiology and stratigraphic age of the large-bodied ornithopod, Muttaburrasaurus langdoni, from the mid-Cretaceous of Australia

   Matthew C. Herne, Joseph J. Bevitt, Luke Milan and 7 coauthors · PeerJ 14, e20794 · 2026

   Open source
3. 03
   Muttaburrasaurus langdoni

   Australian Museum

   Open source
4. 04
   Dinosaurs in the Queensland Museum collection

   Queensland Museum

   Open source