Yandusaurus

Yandusaurus is a genus of basal neornithischian dinosaur from the middle Jurassic (Bathonian age, approximately 168 to 162 Ma) of eastern Asia. The type species is Y. hongheensis, described in 1979 from the Lower Shaximiao Formation of Sichuan Province, China.

==Discovery and naming== thumb|250px|Cast of a Sinraptor mounted as if eating a Yandusaurus, [[Zigong Dinosaur Museum]] In January 1973 the Museum of the Salt Industry at Zigong in Sichuan was warned that during construction activities with a composter at Jinzidang near the Honghe dam inadvertently a dinosaur skeleton had been processed. A team of the museum managed to salvage some heavily damaged remains. Though locally this animal was at first referred to as "Yubasaurus" or "Honghesaurus", in 1979 Beijing professor He Xinlu named and described it as the type species Yandusaurus hongheensis. The generic name is derived from Yandu, the ancient name for Zigong. This name is a contraction of yan, "salt", and du, "capital", occasioned by the fact that Zigong was historically the centre of Chinese salt mining. In this way Yandusaurus indirectly also refers to the Salt Museum. The specific name refers to the Honghe river.