1. Tracking Ancient Life
Dr Liam Herringshaw

2. Key terms Bioturbation Ichnology
(ichnos, Greek: footprint, track, trail)
Trace Fossils

3. 1. What are trace fossils? Sedimentary structures produced by life
- Burrows, borings, tracks, trails, roots...

4. The Lloyds Bank coprolite
...and dung!
The Lloyds Bank coprolite

5. Why they matter Fossil record of behaviour
Fossil record of soft-bodied organisms
Organism-environment interactions
Ecological niche creation
Nutrient flux
Taphonomy
Luminous lugworm

6. The present is the key to the past
Uniformitarianism
The present is the key to the past

7. Ichnological principles
1. Same organism; different traces
Arthropod trace fossils

8. Ichnological principles
2. Different organisms; same traces
Annelid worms
Sea anemones
Phoronids

9. Ichnological principles
3. Same trace; different preservation

10. What trace fossils does the museum have?
2. Traces of Yorkshire
What trace fossils does the museum have?

11. (Burrows, trails; mostly marine)
3. Common trace fossils
(Burrows, trails; mostly marine)

12. Ichnotaxonomy
N.B. Names are for trace fossil only, not organism that made the structure

13. Planolites

14. Skolithos

15. Thalassinoides

16. Thalassinoides tracemaker?

17. Chondrites

18. Ophiomorpha

19. Ophiomorpha tracemaker?

20. Rhizocorallium

21. Rusophycus

22. Rusophycus tracemaker?

23. Trace fossil?
Impression of a jellyfish?
Or a sand volcano?

24. Not trace fossils
Shrinkage cracks

25. Not trace fossils
Flute casts

26. Hand Specimens:
What Have You Got?

27. 4. The Fossil Record of Behaviour

28. Earliest animals? 565 Ma locomotion trails, Newfoundland:
Liu et al. (2010)
content/38/2/123.abstract

29. Ediacaran-Cambrian boundary

30. Cambrian complexity

31. The Cambrian Explosion
Seilacher & Pfluger (1994)

32. Onshore to offshore

33. Colonization of land

34. Plant Trace Fossils

35. Becoming upright
Trackway analysis shows tetrapods become bipedal in early Triassic
Kubo & Benton (2009)

36. The speed of dinosaurs

37. 5. The speed of dinosaurs? Type of footprint? Footprint size?
Animal size?
Stride length?
Speed?
Behaviour?

38. Calculating trackmaker speed
v = 0.25*g0.5*SL1.67*h-1.17
Or, more simply:
Hip height = 4 x footprint length
Stride length/ hip height = speed
(<2 = walking, >3 = running)
Sheffield Geology Group – dinosaur speed calculator:

39. Useful links