Victoria's Fossil Emblem

Skip to main content

Reuse this image

Can I reuse this image without permission? No Cross

Copyright Museums Victoria / All Rights Reserved

Request image

Attribute this image

Museums Victoria https://collections.museumsvictoria.com.au/articles/17146 Request image Share with us (optional)

Please tell us how you intend to reuse this image. This will help us to understand what’s popular and why so that we can continue to improve access to the collections.

What’s your intended use for this image? Please select an option Scholarly or professional research For school, university, etc. Personal or community research Make a print for home To use in a blog or website Publishing in a book Make something else interesting Could you please tell us more? Submit

Conditions of use

Museums Victoria does not own the copyright in all the material on this website. In some cases copyright belongs to third parties and has been published here under a licence agreement: this does not authorise you to copy that material. You may be required to obtain permission from the copyright owner. Some unpublished material may require permission for reuse even if it is very old. Orphan works, where the copyright owner is unknown, also require permission for reuse. First Peoples works may have additional legal and cultural issues. You may be required to seek cultural clearances from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, families, individuals or organisations before you reproduce Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander material.

Images (8)

Videos (9)

Audio (0)

Victoria's Fossil Emblem

All the Australian states and territories have emblems that represent their distinctive natural heritage, including birds, animals and flora. The Victorian state animal is Leadbeater's Possum (Gymnobelideus leadbeateri), the state bird is the Helmeted Honeyeater (Lichenostomus melanops cassidix) the state marine animal is the Weedy Seadragon (Phyllopteryx taeniolatus) and the state flora is the Common Heath (Epacris impressa).

Some also have a fossil emblem. In 2021 the Victorian public voted for a Victorian state fossil emblem, selecting Koolasuchus cleelandi, a giant temnospondyl amphibian from the Early Cretaceous, as the fossil they felt best represents Victoria.

Eight candidate species were selected by scientists at Museums Victoria to meet four criteria:

• The fossil had to represent a distinct organism rather than a group or a trace fossil if it is not known what organism created it,
• That Victoria has the "best" claim on the fossil, for instance it was unique to Victoria or had the most complete examples, or the fossil comes from a significant Victorian fossil site,
• The fossil is scientifically significant, providing important information about the evolution of life,
• It must have the potential to excite public interest, for instance because it was a charismatic or interesting organism, because of its links to a region of Victoria, its historical or cultural significance or it has an interesting discovery story.

The species selected were:

• Isograptus victoriae, a graptolite first recognised from Castlemaine, Victoria and used internationally as a key index fossil for the lower Middle Ordovician.
• Baragwanathia longifolia, an early vascular plant from the late Silurian and Early Devonian that was more complex than most other plants of the same age. It was first described from Yea, Victoria and the Yea Flora Fossil Site is included on the Australian National Heritage List becuase of its importance.
• Bishops whitmorei, a tiny mammal from the Early Cretaceous of Victoria that suggests placental mammals were in Australia a lot earlier than previously thought, challenging our understanding of mammal evolution.
• Koolasuchus cleelandi, a giant temnospondyl amphibian from Early Cretaceous rocks near San Remo, Victoria, which showed temnospondyls had survived at least 50 million years longer in Australia than anywhere else in the world.
• Leaellynasaura amicagraphica, a small ornithischian dinosaur from the Early Cretaceous rocks at Dinosaur Cove on Cape Otway, Victoria that was excavated by tunnelling into the sandstone cliffs.
• Janjucetus hunderi, a toothed whale from the Oligocene known only from Victoria that shows a previously unknown stage in the evolution of baleen whales.
• Pelagornis, one of the few bird fossils found in Victoria, this huge ocean-going bird from the Pliocene is found around the world but is known in Australia only from Victoria.
• Palorchestes azael, a giant marsupial from the Ice Age that lived across eastern Australia but who's best and most significant fossils come from Victoria.

These species demonstrate the diversity of Victoria's fossil record and showcase some of the state's internationally significant fossil sites. They are all represented by specimens in Museums Victoria's collections. Specimens of all the candidate species were on display at Melbourne Museum in the 600 Million Years exhibition in the Science and Life Gallery.

11,563 Victorians voted and in January 2022, the Victorian Government announced that the fossil emblem selected by the public vote was Koolasuchus cleelandi.

More Information

• Keywords

  fossils

• Authors

  Dr Ursula Smith

• Article types

  Physical Object, Text

Got a Question? Send us an enquiry

Related Links

Victoria's new state fossil emblem: Koolasuchus cleelandi "Prehistoric amphibian our new State Fossil Emblem" at Creative Victoria Victoria's fossil emblem campaign Read more about the Victorian state emblems on the Victorian Government website

Share

Facebook Twitter

Cite this page

Smith, U. (2025) Victoria's Fossil Emblem in Museums Victoria Collections https://collections.museumsvictoria.com.au/articles/17146Accessed 25 February 2026

Rights

We support the open release of data and information about our collections. CC BY Text content on this page is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence

Authors

Dr Ursula Smith Senior Coordinator, Digital Collections Access, Sciences at Museums Victoria.

Showing related

article Koolasuchus cleelandi, Victoria's state fossil emblem Koolasuchus cleelandi is the state fossil emblem of Victoria. It is an extinct temnospondyl amphibian. It would have been several meters long from nose to tail, about the size of a saltwater crocodile, and probably looked rather ... article Isograptus victoriae, candidate for Victoria's state fossil emblem Graptolites, the group of fossils to which Isograptus victoriae belongs, are a group of colonial marine animals that lived in the oceans from about 510 to 320 million years ago, from the middle of Cambrian to the middle of the ... article Baragwanathia longifolia, candidate for Victoria's state fossil emblem Baragwanathia longifolia is a fossil club-moss from Victoria. It was very important in the history of our understanding of the evolution of land plants. Dr. Isabel Cookson described Baragwanathia longifolia while working on ... article Bishops whitmorei, candidate for Victoria's state fossil emblem Bishops whitmorei was a very small mammal that lived during the Early Cretaceous (around 125-130 million years ago). It was named after Dr Barry Bishop and Dr Frank Whitmore of the National Geographic Society's Research and ... article Leaellynasaura amicagraphica, candidate for Victoria's state fossil emblem Leaellynasaura amicagraphica was a small ornithischian dinosaur that lived during the Early Cretaceous (around 106 million years ago). Leaellynasaura is only known from a few fossils from Dinosaur Cove on Cape Otway, Victoria. She ... article Janjucetus hunderi, candidate for Victoria's state fossil emblem Janjucetus hunderi is a fossil whale that was found in the limestone of Jan Juc beach near Torquay, Victoria. The genus name comes from the location it was found and the species name was named after the teenager who discovered it, ... article Pelagornis spp., candidate for Victoria's state fossil emblem Pelagornis was a genus of extinct seabirds belonging to the family Pelagornithidae, a group known as the pseudotooth birds. They are called pseudotooth birds because their beaks are edged with points that look like teeth. These ... article Palorchestes azael, candidate for Victoria's state fossil emblem Palorchestes azael was a giant marsupial that lived during the Australian Ice Age. The species and its genus were first described in 1873 by Richard Owen, the founder of the Natural History Museum in London, based on the front ... specimen P 318949 Isograptus victoriae maximus Harris, 1933

Invertebrate Palaeontology

Higher taxonomyHemichordata, Graptolithina, GraptoloideaCollectedAustralia, Victoria specimen P 229329 Baragwanathia longifolia W.H.Lang & Cookson

Palaeobotany

Common nameClub mossHigher taxonomyCharophyta, Equisetopsida, DrepanophycalesCollectedAustralia, Victoria specimen P 210075 Bishops whitmorei Rich et al., 2001

Vertebrate Palaeontology

Type statusHolotypeHigher taxonomyChordata, Mammalia, AusktribosphenidaCollectedAustralia, Victoria specimen P 186213.1 Fossil - Victorian State Fossil Emblem, Koolasuchus cleelandi Warren et al., 1997

Vertebrate Palaeontology

Type statusHolotypeHigher taxonomyChordata, TemnospondyliCollectedAustralia, Victoria specimen P 185990 Leaellynasaura amicagraphica Rich & Vickers-Rich, 1989

Vertebrate Palaeontology

Higher taxonomyChordata, Dinosauria, OrnithischiaCollectedAustralia, Victoria specimen P 218277 Fossil - Bird leg bone, Pelagornis

Vertebrate Palaeontology

Higher taxonomyChordata, Aves, OdontopterygiformesCollectedAustralia, Victoria