Many important fossil discoveries have been made by citizen scientists – curious individuals who noticed something unusual and took the time to contact an expert. 

Dr Anthony Romilio is a palaeo‑ichnologist and evolutionary biologist specialising in dinosaur footprints and fossil trackways. He’s been involved in a number of historically significant amateur fossil discoveries here in Queensland.

To empower us all to be on the lookout, Contact asked Dr Romilio to explain exactly what to do when we come across a rock we think might have a story to tell.

Where you're most likely to find a fossil

Fossils tend to appear wherever rock of the right age is actively being exposed and eroded. On the coast, nature does that work for you – rock platforms visible only at low tide, washed clean by the sea, with fresh surfaces always appearing.

The Great Ocean Road in Victoria and Broome in Western Australia are two of the best examples, both preserving extraordinary dinosaur footprints. What surprises most people is that these sites aren’t remote – thousands of people walk those rocks every year without realising what’s beneath their feet. In Broome, there’s a popular beach-wedding spot where couples exchange vows on a rock platform studded with dinosaur footprints.

Inland, you generally need industry to do the exposing, which is why mine and quarry workers are often best placed to spot something unusual in the overburden or on a freshly cut quarry floor.

Fossils don’t hide in far-off deserts – they turn up in working landscapes that people already visit.

The types of dinosaur fossils you're most likely to come across in Australia

The most commonly encountered dinosaur fossils in Australia are footprints rather than bones. Along Victoria’s southern coast, the rocks date to the Early Cretaceous, around 100–126 million years ago, when dinosaurs lived at polar latitudes as Australia began to separate from Antarctica. The tracks there include ornithopods – plant-eating dinosaurs roughly the size of a large kangaroo – and theropods, the predatory group that gave rise to modern birds, some weighing over 250 kilograms.

Broome preserves a different cast: tracks left around 130 million years ago by long-necked sauropods, multi-tonne plant-eaters that were among the largest animals ever to walk the Earth.

These aren’t rare curiosities. There are thousands of tracks preserved in coastal rock platforms across both regions. The important shift in thinking is recognising that a fossil can be an impression in ancient mud – which is exactly why so many of them go unnoticed.

The signs to watch out for

Fossils tend to have a regularity that random geology doesn’t. A footprint will have toe impressions in roughly the right arrangement; a shell will show consistent ribbing; bone has a distinctive spongy texture in cross-section.

That said, nature is a convincing faker, and even experienced researchers get fooled at times – dismissing real fossils, getting excited about interesting minerals. My advice: don’t try to make the call yourself. What matters is noticing that something looks structured, repeating or just fundamentally different from the rock around it. If it makes you stop and stare, that instinct is worth something.

You don’t need to identify it. That’s what museums and universities are for. You just need to document it well.

What to do the moment you find something

Document everything before you touch anything. Take clear photographs from multiple angles, include something for scale – a business card, a ruler – and record the location as precisely as you can, ideally with a phone GPS coordinate.

Avoid removing the specimen; where a fossil sits, and how it’s oriented, can be as scientifically valuable as the fossil itself. Then contact a state museum or university earth sciences department. Most have straightforward processes for public enquiries, and a good set of photographs is often enough for an expert to assess whether something warrants further investigation.

The main thing is not to let uncertainty stop you. You don’t need to be sure. You just need to make the call.

Citizen scientists do discover important fossils

One of the most remarkable projects I’ve been involved in is along Victoria’s Great Ocean Road coastline, where a colleague of mine, Tim Wagstaff, has been systematically documenting dinosaur footprints in the intertidal rock platforms near Apollo Bay. Tim isn’t a palaeontologist – he’s a house painter – but through dedication and a genuinely sharp eye, he has now recorded over 4,500 dinosaur tracks, averaging around 3 new fossils every single day.

Together we’ve formally described and published some of these finds, with more to come. It’s a remarkable citizen science story.

My number one message to all the fossil fossickers out there

You don’t need qualifications to make a genuinely important discovery. You just need patience and a willingness to keep showing up to look. Tim is proof of that. He didn’t need special equipment. He kept coming back, kept paying attention, and learned to see what was in front of him. Those fossils were always there. Most people just walked past.

The fossil record is still being revealed, and an enormous amount of it will be found by people outside of science. If something looks unusual, photograph it and tell someone. That small action is genuinely all it takes.

Have you already found a specimen that could use an expert review? Contact Dr Romilio using the details listed on his UQ Experts page.