New Lambeosaurini Hadrosaurid from South Central China: First Evidence of Crested Duck-Billed Dinosaurs in the Region!

In a landmark 2025 discovery, paleontologists have announced the first lambeosaurine hadrosaurid from South China—providing the earliest evidence of the crested “helmet-headed” tribe Lambeosaurini on the southern edge of Laurasia.

The fragmentary skeleton, described January 25, 2025, in Historical Biology by Donghao Wang and colleagues, was unearthed at the Taipinggang site in the Upper Cretaceous Dalangshan Formation near Zhaoqing, Guangdong Province. The specimen, preserved in red gravel of the Sanshui Basin, includes dorsal and caudal vertebrae, a humerus, ilium, femur, and tibia. Dated to the Maastrichtian (70–67 million years ago), it represents the first hadrosauroid ever found in this inland basin closest to the South China Sea.

Morphological comparisons and cladistic analyses place the animal firmly within Lambeosaurini—the tribe famous for hollow, resonating cranial crests used for visual and acoustic display. Previously, only four lambeosaurine species were known from China, all from northern or northeastern regions. This southern record dramatically expands the geographic range of these charismatic duck-billed dinosaurs.

The find is especially significant because it co-occurs with tyrannosauroid teeth, confirming a classic Late Cretaceous Laurasian dinosaur ᴀssemblage—hadrosaurs, tyrannosaurs, and other typical northern taxa—thrived in southern China right up to the end of the Cretaceous. Experts note this “proves the Sanshui Basin once hosted a rich, diverse ecosystem previously thought absent from the south.”

From the red beds of Guangdong, this unnamed lambeosaurine emerges as a vital missing link, showing crested hadrosaurs ranged far wider across Asia than anyone suspected. Paleontology’s hadrosaur story just gained its most southerly—and most surprising—chapter yet!