Devonian tetrapod trackways and trackmakers; a review of the fossils and footprints

Clack, Jennifer A.

doi:10.1016/s0031-0182(96)00142-3

Cited by 79 publications

(69 citation statements)

References 66 publications

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“…The age of the Worange Point fish assemblage has been widely discussed in the scientific literature (Ahlberg et al 2001;Clack 1997Clack , 2002Clack , 2006, mainly because Young (1993 p. 235) suggested that the tetrapod tracks from the Genoa River (see below) may represent 'another occurrence of the Worange Point fauna'. Initially, the age of the Worange Point fish assemblage was interpreted as 'late Famennian or younger' (Young 1979 p. 103).…”

Section: Age Constraintsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One track has no tail or body trace, and digit impressions on the manus and pes (hand and foot) show that these were directed at right angles to the body (Figure 4f), a primitive condition compared with typical Early Carboniferous footprints with anteriorly directed digits (Carroll et al 2005). The well-known Acanthostega from East Greenland has a similarly sized hand and foot (Clack 1997 figure 1A). The second trackway has a sinuous tail trace, and manus much smaller than the pes, the condition known in the Russian form Tulerpeton (Clack 1997 figure 2).…”

Section: Combyingbar Formation (Genoa River Beds)mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The well-known Acanthostega from East Greenland has a similarly sized hand and foot (Clack 1997 figure 1A). The second trackway has a sinuous tail trace, and manus much smaller than the pes, the condition known in the Russian form Tulerpeton (Clack 1997 figure 2). Clack (1997 p. 241) suggested that either trackway could have been made by an Acanthostega-like animal walking semi-supported in shallow water, but if the tracks were formed subaerially (as suggested by associated mud cracks at the locality: personal observation) then neither of the Greenland tetrapods (Ichthyostega, Acanthostega: Jarvik 1996; Clack 2002) is likely to have made the first trackway.…”

Section: Combyingbar Formation (Genoa River Beds)mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Devonian formations, vertebrate faunas and age control on the far south coast of New South Wales and adjacent Victoria

Young¹

2007

Australian Journal of Earth Sciences

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Section: Age Constraintsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Combyingbar Formation (Genoa River Beds)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Combyingbar Formation (Genoa River Beds)mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Devonian formations, vertebrate faunas and age control on the far south coast of New South Wales and adjacent Victoria

Young¹

2007

Australian Journal of Earth Sciences

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“…Discovered by Norman A. Wakefield in 1971, this material was described as three distinct tetrapod trackways by Warren and Wakefield (1972) and Clack (1997), with subsequent work focusing mainly on the two better preserved footprint sets, believed to be distinct in form (Clack, 2002;Young, 2006;. Biostratigraphic and lithological indicators summarised by Young (2006) suggested a Frasnian age for the locality, but did not describe any fossils to support this.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Upper Devonian osteichthyan remains from the Genoa River, Victoria, Australia

Holland¹

2010

MMV

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Holland, T. 2010. Upper Devonian osteichthyan remains from the Genoa River, Victoria, Australia. Memoirs of Museum Victoria 67: 35-44.The Genoa River Trackway site in the Upper Devonian Combyingbar Formation represents one of the earliest records of tetrapods (land vertebrates) from Australia. However, the osteichthyan assemblage from the site is poorly known compared to other Devonian tetrapod localities. New information from a tetrapodomorph fish lower jaw possibly indicates the first record of a tristichopterid from the Genoa River Beds. The specimen shares a posteroventral embayment in the profile of lower jaw with Eusthenopteron foordi, Platycephalichthys bischoffi, and Moroccan tristichopterid material, as well an isolated specimen of the 'osteolepidid' Gyroptychius. Polyplocodont and dendrodont teeth are also described from the Genoa River, with the latter indicating the presence of a large, porolepiform taxon. The antiarch placoderm Remigolepis represents the most abundant fossil fish taxon recorded from the Genoa River. The possible presence of phyllolepid placoderm material may support previous suggestions of a pre-Famennian age for the Genoa River Beds.

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“…Second, feet that deform malleable substrates leave tracks. Footprints can be a major source of information about an animal or group of animals (4-6), and this is particularly true for extinct taxa that cannot be observed directly (7)(8)(9). Indeed, the only movements that have been recorded in the fossil record were necessarily over/through suitably compliant substrates (10).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

The birth of a dinosaur footprint: Subsurface 3D motion reconstruction and discrete element simulation reveal track ontogeny

Falkingham

Gatesy

2014

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Locomotion over deformable substrates is a common occurrence in nature. Footprints represent sedimentary distortions that provide anatomical, functional, and behavioral insights into trackmaker biology. The interpretation of such evidence can be challenging, however, particularly for fossil tracks recovered at bedding planes below the originally exposed surface. Even in living animals, the complex dynamics that give rise to footprint morphology are obscured by both foot and sediment opacity, which conceals animal-substrate and substrate-substrate interactions. We used X-ray reconstruction of moving morphology (XROMM) to image and animate the hind limb skeleton of a chicken-like bird traversing a dry, granular material. Foot movement differed significantly from walking on solid ground; the longest toe penetrated to a depth of ∼5 cm, reaching an angle of 30°below horizontal before slipping backward on withdrawal. The 3D kinematic data were integrated into a validated substrate simulation using the discrete element method (DEM) to create a quantitative model of limb-induced substrate deformation. Simulation revealed that despite sediment collapse yielding poor quality tracks at the airsubstrate interface, subsurface displacements maintain a high level of organization owing to grain-grain support. Splitting the substrate volume along "virtual bedding planes" exposed prints that more closely resembled the foot and could easily be mistaken for shallow tracks. DEM data elucidate how highly localized deformations associated with foot entry and exit generate specific features in the final tracks, a temporal sequence that we term "track ontogeny." This combination of methodologies fosters a synthesis between the surface/layer-based perspective prevalent in paleontology and the particle/volume-based perspective essential for a mechanistic understanding of sediment redistribution during track formation.T errestrial locomotion is vital to the survival of many vertebrate animals, and is expressed in typical behaviors such as food acquisition, predator avoidance, mate finding, and population dispersal. Generalized models of legged movement are typically derived from laboratory studies of walking and running on stiff, solid surfaces; however, locomotion over compliant, yielding substrates is also important, for two reasons. First, animals frequently encounter such terrain-unconsolidated desert sand, river banks, shorelines, snow, or simply soil after rain-in their natural environments. Movement over such deformable substrates is, accordingly, a major research area in biomechanics and robotics (1-3). Second, feet that deform malleable substrates leave tracks. Footprints can be a major source of information about an animal or group of animals (4-6), and this is particularly true for extinct taxa that cannot be observed directly (7-9). Indeed, the only movements that have been recorded in the fossil record were necessarily over/through suitably compliant substrates (10).Despite tracks being so common and holding so much potential,...

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Devonian tetrapod trackways and trackmakers; a review of the fossils and footprints

Cited by 79 publications

References 66 publications

Devonian formations, vertebrate faunas and age control on the far south coast of New South Wales and adjacent Victoria

Devonian formations, vertebrate faunas and age control on the far south coast of New South Wales and adjacent Victoria

Upper Devonian osteichthyan remains from the Genoa River, Victoria, Australia

The birth of a dinosaur footprint: Subsurface 3D motion reconstruction and discrete element simulation reveal track ontogeny

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