Lark Quarry Dinosaur Trackways facts for kids
The Dinosaur Stampede National Monument at Lark Quarry Conservation Park is a super cool place in Queensland, Australia. It's also known as Lark Quarry or Dinosaur Stampede. This site is famous for having thousands of fossilised dinosaur footprints!
For a long time, people thought these footprints showed the only known dinosaur stampede in the world. The idea was that a big predator dinosaur scared about 150 smaller, two-legged dinosaurs, making them run away. However, scientists have recently started to think differently. New evidence suggests the footprints might have been made by dinosaurs simply crossing a river at different times.
These amazing fossils are between 104 and 92 million years old. They are found in sandstone from a rock layer called the Winton Formation. Since 2016, the Australian Age of Dinosaurs Museum has helped run tours at the site. This helps visitors learn more about Australia's unique dinosaurs and the ancient world they lived in.
Lark Quarry is about 110 km (68 miles) south-west of a town called Winton in western Queensland.
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What Happened at Lark Quarry?
For many years, the main story about Lark Quarry was exciting! Imagine this: 104 to 92 million years ago, a large group of about 180 small dinosaurs were hanging out. Some were as tiny as chickens, while others were the size of a bantam chicken or even an emu. Suddenly, a much bigger dinosaur, maybe a meat-eater like Australovenator (which could be up to 6 metres long!), showed up.
Scientists thought this big dinosaur scared the smaller ones, causing them to run in a panic. The small dinosaur tracks were given special names: Skartopus for the tiny ones and Wintonopus for the slightly larger ones. The big tracks were first thought to be from a large meat-eating dinosaur.
New Ideas About the Tracks
However, scientists keep studying and learning new things! In 1994, researchers looked closer at the big tracks. They realized these tracks might actually belong to a large plant-eating dinosaur, like Muttaburrasaurus, instead of a meat-eater. These big tracks are now thought to be from a dinosaur called Amblydactylus.
More recent research by Anthony Romilio and his team has changed the story even more. They studied the ancient mud and sand where the tracks were made. They found that the area was likely a seasonal river channel. This means water flowed at different depths and speeds over time.
The scientists now believe the footprints were probably made over a period of time, maybe even several days. Dinosaurs would have crossed the river channel at different moments. They also found that the tracks named Skartopus and Wintonopus look very similar. This suggests they might have been made by the same type of plant-eating, two-legged dinosaur. So, it might not have been a sudden stampede after all!
How the Footprints Were Saved
No matter what exactly happened, the footprints were preserved in an amazing way. Soon after the dinosaurs walked there, the water level in the river began to rise. This covered the fresh footprints with sandy mud before they could dry out. As the water levels kept changing, more layers of sand and mud piled on top.
Over millions of years, this ancient river plain, with its sandy channels, swamps, and lush forests, slowly dried up. The mud and sand covering the footprints were squashed down and turned into hard rock. This is why we can still see these incredible dinosaur tracks today!
Discovery and Protection
The dinosaur footprints were first found in the 1960s by a station manager named Glen Seymour. He discovered them in a nearby area called Seymour Quarry.
Later, in 1976–77, a team of scientists from the Queensland Museum, including Mary Wade and Tony Thulborn, along with people from the University of Queensland, started digging at Lark Quarry. The quarry was named after Malcolm Lark, a volunteer who helped remove a lot of rock. Together, they dug out over 60 tonnes of rock! They uncovered about 210 square metres (2,260 square feet) of the rock layer with the fossils. This amazing area shows about 3,300 dinosaur footprints!
At first, a simple roof was built over the site to protect it. But this didn't stop the weather from slowly damaging the precious footprints. So, in 2002, a special building was constructed to cover the main collection of footprints. This building is super important because it helps keep the temperature and humidity steady. It also stops water from running over the footprints and keeps people and animals from stepping on them.
Because of its unique importance for research and its rarity, the Dinosaur Stampede National Monument was added to the Australian National Heritage List on July 20, 2004.
You might have heard that the Lark Quarry tracks inspired the famous Gallimimus stampede scene in the movie Jurassic Park. This idea came from the original thought that the tracks showed a dinosaur stampede caused by a predator. However, the idea of a stampede has been questioned, and a consultant for Jurassic Park has said that the tracks were not the inspiration for the movie scene.
See also
- List of fossil sites
- Protected areas of Queensland
