Fostoria

Say it: fos-TOR-ee-uh

Name means: “named after Robert Foster, who discovered the fossils; the species name dhimbangunmal means 'sheep yard' in local Australian languages”1

Ate: PlantsBeaked plant-eatersLate Cretaceous

Fostoria was a plant-eating dinosaur that lived in Australia about 100 million years ago. It walked on two legs and had a beak for snipping leaves. Fossils of at least four Fostoria were found together in an opal mine.1 2

Lived

100 to 94 million years ago3

Late Cretaceous

Fossils found in

Lightning Ridge, New South Wales, Australia1 2

Food

Plants3

When did it live?

Triassic

Jurassic

Cretaceous

252 million years ago20114566, the asteroid

cool stuff

Fun facts

Fostoria is known from at least four individuals found together in a bone bed, the first ornithopod-dominated bone bed discovered in Australia.2

All of the Fostoria fossils are preserved in opal, a precious gemstone.2

The first Fostoria fossil was discovered in 1984 by opal miner Bob Foster, who thought it was a horse hoof.1

Fostoria belongs to a group of dinosaurs called iguanodontians, which are relatives of the famous Iguanodon.1

The partial skull of Fostoria is the first dinosaur skull ever found in New South Wales, Australia.2

Scientists think Fostoria lived during the Cenomanian age, about 100 to 94 million years ago.3

AI-made picture of Fostoria — An AI-made picture of how Fostoria might have looked, made by a computer from what scientists know. It is a guess: the real animal may have looked different, and nobody knows its true colours.

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Scientific name: Fostoria
Named by: Bell et al. 20193
Group: Beaked plant-eaters
Family / clade: Elasmaria3
Classification: Ornithischia > Ornithopoda > Iguanodontia3
Age of the rocks: 100 to 94 million years (Cenomanian)3
Rock formations: Griman Creek3
Countries: Australia3
Fossil records: 2 in the Paleobiology Database3
Discovery: In 1984, opal miner Bob Foster found a vertebra from an ornithopod in Lightning Ridge, Australia. He showed his many fossil finds to paleontologists, who later excavated more bones. The dinosaur was named Fostoria dhimbangunmal in 2019 by Bell and colleagues.1 2
Still debated: Scientists are not sure exactly where Fostoria fits in the dinosaur family tree. Some studies place it with rhabdodontomorphs, while others group it with other Gondwanan iguanodontians.1 3

Where the facts come from

Fostoria dhimbangunmal (en.wikipedia.org)
Fostoria dhimbangunmal, gen. et sp. nov., a new iguanodontian (Dinosauria, Ornithopoda) from the mid-Cretaceous of Lightning Ridge, New South Wales, Australia - University of New England (researchers.une.edu.au)
Fostoria in The Paleobiology Database (CC BY 4.0): age, places, rock formations, classification.

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