110 million years ago a baby stegosaurus left footprints in the Tugulu Group, in China’s Xinjiang province. The footprint is only 15% of the length of the Deltapodus curriei type from the same locality. It belongs to l ichnogenus Deltapodus and coexists with the tracks of larger individuals.
“This footprint was made by an armored herbivorous dinosaur widely known as a stegosaurus, the family of dinosaurs that includes the famous Stegosaurus,” says Anthony Romilio, a paleontologist at the Faculty of Biological Sciences at the University of Queensland and a co-author of the journal’s publication. Palaios. “Like the Stegosaurus, this little dinosaur probably had spikes on its tail and bony plates along its back as an adult.”
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At just 6 centimeters, it is the smallest footprint of a stegosaurus ever found. By comparison, adult stegosaurus footprints are of a completely different size, for in the age of dinosaurs, some of the largest living things to ever exist on the face of the Earth left gigantic footprints as they moved along. his step. Among those tracks, there are also more modest size ones, like this stegosaurus the size of a house cat.
The international team of paleontologists say this indicates that the dinosaur was likely surrounded by older, fully developed relatives.
“It is in sharp contrast to other stegosaurus tracks found at this site, which measured up to 30 centimeters and the tracks found in places like Broome in Western Australia, where they can be up to 80 centimeters, ” Romilio clarifies in a statement.
The tiny footprint (compared to adults, which are about six times larger) has similar characteristics to other stegosaurus, with three short, broad, round fingerprints. However, experts noted that “the small footprint shows that this dinosaur had been moving with its heel lifted off the ground,” something that had previously only been seen in dinosaurs that walked on two legs. The young stegosaurs had a different gait than the much more robust adults … perhaps these small stegosaurus walked on two legs as well?
“This could be possible as this is the ancestral condition and posture of most dinosaurs, but the stegosaurus could also have switched to walking on its heels as it aged,” says study leader Lida Xing.
But the baby stegosaurus had its heel lifted, indicating that it was walking on tiptoe, like a cat or a bird, without touching the ground with the sole of its foot.
Stegosaurs were heavy, four-legged dinosaurs that walked with all feet on the ground. “The stegosaurus could have switched to walking on its heels as it aged,” Xing said. “A full set of clues from these small footprints would provide us with the answer to this question, but unfortunately we only have one footprint.”
Hopefully they can find new traces of similar characteristics to clear up this mystery.
Referencia: Lida Xing et al. 2021. Stegosaur track assemblage from Xinjiang, China, featuring the smallest known stegosaur record. Palaios 36 (2): 68-76; doi: 10.2110/palo.2020.036
