The Lark Quarry located near the city of Winton in Queensland (Australia) is your website of among the most important assortment of dinosaur tracks discovered to date. When these tracks were first studied by Dr. Tony Thulborn and his colleague Mary Wade and their work published in 1984, the footprints caused a sensation as the different trackways were interpreted as herd of smaller Ornithopod dinosaurs in the company of some Coelurosaurs stampeding after they certainly were cornered by way of a lumbering giant Theropod dinosaur.
Important Trace Fossil Site in Australia
Ichnologists (scientists who study trace fossils, especially footprints), assigned the name Wintonopus to the little, Ornithopods, Skartopus to the more expensive Coelurosaurs and the eleven prints believed to describe the large, predatory Theropod attempting the ambush were assigned to Tyrannosauropus. However, a fresh paper published in the academic publication “The Journal of Vertebrate Palaeontology” interprets the tracks in an exceedingly different way. Lead author, Queensland palaeontologist Anthony Romilio presents evidence to suggest these footprints aren’t evidence of a dinosaur ambush with a resulting stampede but the tracks made by dinosaurs while they forded a river. In place of “Walking with Dinosaurs”, this new research suggests a scenario of “Swimming as well as Wading with Dinosaurs”!
Cretaceous Dinosaur Trackways
The footprints are believed to date from around 95 million years ago approximately (Albian to Cenomanian faunal stages), the strata that the footprints were discovered in does represent fluvial deposits (river sediments), however, this new interpretation proposes that the tracks were made by dinosaurs whilst in the water and not on the river bank. Walking along a river bed, especially one where in fact the water may have been only forty centimetres deep might have made sense if the banks were heavily vegetated, progress through dense scrub and forests would have been much slower if the dinosaurs had chosen a land route.
The Queensland palaeontologist stated that lots of the footprints and impressions made by the dinosaurs were simply scratches or elongated grooves preserved in the rock. These could possibly be interpretated as marks made by the dinosaurs while they punted or waded over the river bed. what dinosaur has 500 teeth Some of the more unusual tracks could represent “tippy-toe” traces, where a dog made deep, nearly vertical impressions in to the soft river bed with its clawed toes while they propelled themselves through the body of water.
In the paper, the scientist argues it is difficult to see how a tracks might have been made by a dog walking or running on land, even one panicked by an ambush from the predator. If the tracks have been made on land the impressions made would have been much flatter.
Not the First Exemplory case of a Swimming Dinosaur Found to Date
Fossilised footprints of a swimming dinosaur have been within the past. There’s a very important single dinosaur trackway discovered in Spain that seems to exhibit a tri-dactyl, Theropod dinosaur touching the bottom of a river occasionally because it swam across it. The sediments preserve the claw marks and impressions made by the dinosaur at it touched the lake bed and pushed itself off again to keep its journey.
Very Important Scientific Site in Queensland
The Lark Quarry site represents among the most important sets of dinosaur footprints recognized to science. Significantly more than 3,000 individual prints have been identified so far. A number of the tracks, such as the “dinosaur stampede/river crossing site” are on public display.
Modern Technology Used to Assess Ancient Trackways
Using three-dimensional footprint mapping techniques, the University of Queensland scientist has provided a number of new insights in to the dinosaur tracks of Lark Quarry. In 2010, Anthony Romilio published a scientific paper that suggested that the footprints assigned to the meat-eater Tyrannosauropus were actually made by a large, herbivorous Ornithopod, a dinosaur just like Muttaburrasaurus for example.
Commenting on the newly published research and reflecting on the earlier work suggesting that the large dinosaur tracks were not made by a predator, Anthony stated that taken completely, the investigation suggested that the Lark Quarry sediments didn’t portray a dinosaur stampede.
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