Tracking dinosaurs in BLM canyon country, Utah

Abstract

Production Editors GEOLOGY OF THE INTERMOUNTAIN WEST an open-access journal of the Utah Geological Association Volume 3 2016 67 ABSTRACTThe remarkably extensive and abundant Mesozoic-aged exposures on public lands around Moab have made this region well known for ichnofossils. The nearly complete record of Upper Triassic through Lower Cretaceous rocks exposed in this area is well known for its sheer abundance of tracks and traces. This three-day field trip will visit many important classic and new sites exposed in the Bureau of Land Management's Canyon Country District. This field trip guidebook will give one an overview of the major sites we will visit, as well as a brief summary of work previously done in these areas.

Paleontology of the Bears Ears National Monument: history of exploration and designation of the monument

“…13;Baker 1936: pg. 50;Lockley and Hunt, 1995;Schults-Pittman et al, 1996;Lockley et al, 2004;Smith and Foster, 2004;Lockley and Gierliński, 2006;Lucas et al, 2006c;Hunt-Foster et al, 2016). At these sites, the presence of Brachychirotherium and absence of Eubrontes in the lower Wingate and vice versa in the upper Wingate, along with the presence of synapsid, Batrachopus, and Otozoum tracks, is consistent with the placement of the Triassic-Jurassic boundary somewhere in the middle of the formation (Lockley et al, 2004;Lucas et al, 2006c).…”

“…This major site preserves over 250 footprints on a single horizon in the Church Rock Member. It is dominated by tracks of Brachychirotherium (thought to be made by aetosaurs; see Heckert et al, 2010;, but Atreipus-like tridactyl prints are also preserved (Lockley and Hunt 1995;Hunt-Foster et al, 2016).…”

Triassic pentadactyl tracks from the Los Menucos Group (Río Negro province, Patagonia Argentina): possible constraints on the autopodial posture of Gondwanan trackmakers

“…Outside of the Southern Africa, tracks tentatively referred to the ichnogenus were reported from Upper Triassic Chinle Group of Utah (Lockley & Hunt, 1995; Hunt-Foster et al, 2016) and Colorado (Gaston et al, 2003, Fig. 12B), both USA.…”

Paleontology of the Bears Ears National Monument: history of exploration and designation of the monument

“…Discoveries include multiple taxa of leaves, a quarry containing many articulated actinopterygian fish, metoposaurid temnospondyls, phytosaur skulls and associated skeletons, aetosaurs, "rauisuchians", skeletal remains of small as-yet unidentified tetrapods, and a diversity of tetrapod footprints (e.g., Brachychirotherium, Rhynchosauroides, Evazoum, and Gwyneddichnium; see Hunt-Foster et al, 2016). To the east, just outside of the BENM area, the same joint team has discovered a similar fossil assemblage in the Kane Springs beds and Church Rock Member in Lisbon Valley, recording leaves of ferns, bennettitaleans, and Sanmiguelia, conchostracans, ostracods, molluscs, multiple taxa of actinopterygian fish, coelacanths, metoposaurid amphibians, the phytosaur Redondasaurus, the aetosaur Typothorax, paracrocodylomorphs, and footprints from the ichnotaxa Grallator, Brachychirotherium, Apatopus, and Rhynchosauroides (Milner, 2006;Milner et al, 2006Milner et al, , 2011Gibson, 2013aGibson, , 2013bGibson, , 2015Ash et al, 2014;Martz et al, 2014;Hunt-Foster et al, 2016: figs. 6-12, table 1).…”