Pterosaur tracks in Shandong Province, China

[Ben Creisler <bcreisler@gmail.com>]

From: Ben Creisler
bcreisler@gmail.com

A new online paper:


Li-Da Xing, Jerald D. Harris, Gerard D. Gierliński, Murray K. Gingras,
Julien D. Divay, Yong-Gang Tang & Philip J. Currie (2012)
Early Cretaceous Pterosaur tracks from a “buried” dinosaur tracksite
in Shandong Province, China.
Palaeoworld (advance online publication)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.palwor.2012.02.004
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1871174X12000054?v=s5



Here we describe the pterosaur and tridactyl dinosaur footprint
assemblage from a new tracksite in the Early Cretaceous Qugezhuang
Formation near the Wenxiyuan Community in Jimo County-level City,
Qingdao City, Shandong Province, East China. The construction of a
community building has, since the discovery, covered the majority of
tracks, but a few specimens on abandoned building stones constitute
the first pterosaur track record in eastern China. The pterosaur
tracks are assigned to Pteraichnus isp. and were probably made by a
small to medium-sized pterodactyloid. The new pterosaur trackway
contributes to the growing database of pterosaurian ichnites in Asia.
The Wenxiyuan tridactyl dinosaur tracks are morphologically similar to
those of theropods, but they are too poorly preserved to be referred
to any particular ichnotaxon.