Overview
- A peer‑reviewed paper published May 26, 2026 formally names Labrujasuchus expectatus from the Hayden Quarry at Ghost Ranch and provides a diagnosis based on a partial skeleton and associated material.
- The animal was a small‑to‑moderate sized biped with tiny forelimbs and a toothless, beak‑tipped mouth, giving it an overall silhouette very like later ornithomimosaur (ostrich‑like) dinosaurs despite being on the crocodile side of the archosaur family tree.
- Authors assign the taxon to Shuvosauridae using four unique anatomical features, including a diagnostic coracoid fossa and distinct femoral and humeral traits that tie it to other shuvosaurids.
- The fossil is dated to the middle Norian at about 212 million years ago and occupies a predicted intermediate time slot between earlier and later North American shuvosaurs, reducing a key temporal gap in the regional record.
- The discovery, reported by the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County after two decades of work at Ghost Ranch, underscores Triassic morphological experimentation, highlights that shuvosaur diversity remains undersampled, and points to more field and museum study as the next step.