First Jurassic-Era Armored Dinosaur Footprint in the World Found in Colorado (5/23/2008)

Aklyosaur footpring

Although some dinosaurs are relatively common, finding them and their tracks is often difficult and painstaking work. Kent Hups, a former UC Denver student and a science teacher at Manuel High School in Denver has made tracking of the armored dinosaurs, known as ankylosaurs, something of a specialty. These dinosaurs, relatives of Stegosaurus, the Colorado state fossil, are sometimes referred to as the dreadnoughts of the dinosaurian world.

Hups is well-known in the local paleontological community for his finds in western Colorado where he has worked for many years, under Bureau of Land Management permits. He first made a name for himself as a dreadnought tracker by finding one of the most complete skeletons of the type known as Mymoorepelta at a Jurassic site in Cactus Park near Grand Junction, Colo. This spring, while continuing his work at Cactus Park, he found the perfectly preserved footprint of one of these armored denizens of the Jurassic.

"This is not just any old footprint," said Martin Lockley, professor of geology and a dinosaur track expert at the Dinosaur Tracks Museum at UC Denver. "This is the first and only ankylosaur footprint ever found in the Jurassic, anywhere in the world. It is another tracking first for Colorado. We are all very excited."

Hups has organized digs with many different groups ranging from school kids, and university students to members of the Mensa organization. "It has always been my primary goal to involve students in hands on science," he said. "Our students at Manual High School helped to clean the specimen and make replicas."

"Kent is a first-rate replica maker," said Professor Lockley. "We have worked together for many years making international dinosaur track exhibits. He is very good when it comes to finding bones and making replicas but usually not as lucky in the discovery of tracks - I can't really tease him about that anymore with this great find."

The well-preserved five-toed ankylosaur track is a front footprint. It comes from the world-famous Morrison Formation which is late Jurassic in age (about 150 million years old). This deposit has produced evidence of brontosaurs, stegosaurs and allosaurs, but few ankylosaurs.

"Although no other Jurassic ankylosaur tracks have been found anywhere in the world, the track is very similar to one known as Tetrapodosaurus from Cretaceous deposits in Canada that are 40 million years younger," said Lockley. "Today, even though knowledge of the armored dinosaurs is improving, ankylosaur tracks are still rare. We are not surprised to find ankylosaur tracks in the Cretaceous but finding them in the Jurassic -- that's really significant."

The track, which is about 9 inches (24 cm) long and 12 inches (30 cm) wide, is larger than all the Cretaceous examples. It is also bigger than any known Jurassic foot skeletons. "This means we can start looking for bigger and better ankylosaur skeletons in the Morrison Formation," said Hups.

Hups and Lockley invited John Foster, Museum of Western Colorado curator of the skeletal material from Cactus Park, and Gerard Gierlinski of the Polish Geological Institute to collaborate on the project. The group has worked together previously on diverse paleontology projects. They have also submitted their preliminary findings to the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology for presentation at its annual meeting this fall, and a preliminary report will appear in Dinosaur Ridge report in late May. The unique specimen will go to the BLM repository in Caņon City, Colo. with replicas made at Manuel High School, UC Denver and the Museum of Western Colorado. The University of Colorado Denver is one of three universities in the University of Colorado system. Located in Denver on the Downtown Campus and at Ninth & Colorado Blvd., and on the Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora, Colo., University of Colorado Denver is Colorado's premier research university offering more than 100 degrees and programs in 13 schools and colleges and serving more than 28,000 students in Metro Denver and online. For more information, visit the web site at www.ucdhsc.edu or the UC Denver Newsroom at www.uchsc.edu/news.

Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by the University of Colorado

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