Austrosaurus

*Austrosaurus mckillopi*

***Austrosaurus*** ("southern lizard") is a sauropod dinosaur that lived the Allaru Formation, from the early Cretaceous (98-95 million years ago) of Central-Western Queensland in Australia. It could grow to 50-60 feet (15.24 meters) in length.

## Discovery and species

The remains were discovered by Mr. H.B. Wade on Clutha Station near Maxwelton in north Queensland in 1932, who alerted the station manager H. Mackillop, who showed his brother who sent them to the Queensland Museum. *Austrosaurus* was described by Heber Longman in 1933.

In 1999 on a property near Winton in Central West Queensland, Australia, grazier Dave Elliott found a sauropod femur belonging to what turned out to be the largest dinosaur discovered in Australia to that date, which was nicknamed 'Elliot'. At the Winton find, a right femur and portions of several ribs have so far been uncovered. A smaller sauropod, nicknamed 'Mary', after Dr Mary Wade, has also been uncovered. Early indications are that they are closely related to *Austrosaurus mackillopi* and either in the same or closely related genus.

On 3 May 2007, bones from the remains of two huge titanosaurs which were uncovered in 2004 near Eromanga in South West Queensland went on display at the Queensland Museum, in Brisbane. This find was described by the ABC news service as the largest bones now discovered to date in Australia, eclipsing 'Elliot'.

## Paleobiology

Originally it was thought that sauropods spent time near or in water to relieve weight from their legs.However, this theory is now rejected and it is believed that *Austrosaurus* like all sauropods lived on dry land. Fossil finds suggest a height of approximately 3.9 metres at the hip and 4.1 metres at the shoulder, which would have given it an almost level back. According to Gregory S. Paul, it was 20 meters long and weighed about 16, 000 kg.

## Classification

Initially, *Austrosaurus* was considered a cetiosaurid. Hocknull et al. (2009) described the new sauropod *Wintonotitan* from material that originally assigned to *Austrosaurus* by Coombs and Molnar in 1981. Hocknull suggested that *Austrosaurus mckillopi* differed only slightly from the QMF 7292, the holotype of *Wintonotitan wattsii*, and should be considered a *nomen dubium*. Recently, Poropat et al. (2017) reported additional sauropod material from the *Austrosaurus* type locality and assigned them to the *Austrosaurus* holotype, finding the genus to be a valid titanosauriform tentatively assignable to Somphospondyli.

## JPInstitute.com Description

Austrosaurus was a large, long-necked plant-eater that lived in Australia. The island nation of Australia is not known for great fossil discoveries. In fact, paleontologists must work very hard just to find a few bones. Although the large sauropod fossil is made up of only a few broken bones, scientists have determined that it may fit into the same family as Brachiosaurus.

This was only the second sauropod to be discovered in Australia and there are very few remains. A few partial bones of a larger sauropod from another Australian site may belong to this genus.

## Links

https://web.archive.org/web/20031006082301fw\_/http://www.jpinstitute.com/dinopedia/dinocards/dc\_austr.html
https://web.archive.org/web/20040214161752/http://www.jpinstitute.com/dinopedia/dinocards/dc\_austr.html#