Who’s that getting footy prints all over my desert?–Yosemite Sam
Among the more than 500 hundred prints are the tracks of at least two different carnivores, and two herbivores, including one armored dinosaur. Also present are the prints of a baby dinosaur and a crocodile.
Most of the prints are simple depressions, the details lost to time. However, a few (like the herbivore print above) have clear margins and even retain some information about the structure of the foot that made it.
Say that three times fast
The print on the left is from Acrocanthosaurus, with an artist’s depiction on the right. Not someone you would want to meet in a dark alley–or in bright sunlight, for that matter! Personally, I would really like to know how they know it was that particular dinosaur who left the track.
A clumsy moment preserved for all time
The tracks here show a near fall which a dinosaur saved by a tail. And you thought those baby pictures your mother saved for a few years were bad!
Dinosaurs weren’t the only things that left their mark
I never expected to see preserved worm burrows (left) and mud cracks (right) at a dinosaur trackway.
New Mexico is a dinosaur rich state. Clayton Lake State Park is only one of the places to find dinosaurs. The Ruth Hall Museum of Paleontology displays fossils of the state dinosaur, Coelophysis. Las Cruces has both the Prehistoric Trackways National Monument and the Las Cruces Museum of Natural History. Of course, the state Museum of Natural History has a grand collection of fossils, as well as other items of interest.
I loved our trip to Clayton Lake State Park. One of the best parts was watching young children see the evidence left behind by the giants of another age. Another great part was watching Clark try to catch a scent from these tracks! This is definitely a great family destination.