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Re: Sauropods in wet versus dry environments... a tip of the hat to some past artists (Was Re. Lost Worlds)



At 5:43 PM -0500 1/16/02, Ray Stanford wrote:

Let's add in many other wet sauropod track sites, including the famous and excellently detailed sauropod trackways near Glen Rose, Texas, which are in a carbonate (hence marine-derived) substrate, as are others from Texas and Arkansas. Add also the ones I have found here in two different counties here in Maryland, which occur in several different types of substrate, but all of which indicate wetlands types of paleoenvironment, ranging from seemingly deltaic fan type situations, to outright swamps, and maybe flood plains.

[clipped]
    Off the top of my head I can recall no sauropod tracks or trackways from
other than rather wet environs.  Of course, there may be a preservational
bias in all this, but I doubt for several reasons that sauropods would
survive very long in areas without plenty of water.


Remember, however, that dinosaurs, no matter how big, are not likely to leave footprints in dry hard-packed soil or dry sand. You are most likely to leave footprints that have a chance to be preserved when you walk through mud. It's not really a preservational bias -- it's a bias in where the tracks could be made in the first place. -- Jeff Hecht