011918c

313 million-year-old trace fossils. Attenosaurs were reptile-like amphibians.  This footprint is about the size  of an adult human hand. The amphibian trackway is called Nanopus reidiae. Its maker would have looked like a salamander. There is a third trace fossil on the slab. Can you find it?

Read a lot more about this in our book "Footprints in Stone."

https://www.amazon.com/Footprints-Stone-Fossil-Coal-Age-Tetrapods/dp/0817358447/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1469797628&sr=1-1&keywords=%22footprints+in+stone%22

This book helped the American museum solve an 87 year old mystery:

https://www.ua.edu/news/2018/01/ua-book-helps-solve-87-year-old-fossil-mystery/

Minkin site photos

Attenosaurus subulensis, the footprint of a top predator, and raindrop impressions, both 313 million years old, much older than dinosaurs. Raindrop impressions are very rare at the site, because the muddy tidal flat rarely dried out. The maker of A. subulensis looked a bit like an alligator, and far outweighed any other land animals found in the area.

New book about the site, Footprints in Stone:

https://www.amazon.com/Footprints-Stone-Fossil-Coal-Age-Tetrapods/dp/0817358447/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1469578003&sr=8-1&keywords=kopaska-merkel

Reviews of Footprints in Stone

https://muse.jhu.edu/book/44885

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/footprints-in-stone-ronald-j-buta-phd/1123112917 and a low price on the Nook version

https://www.bibliovault.org/BV.titles.epl?tquery=Paleontology -- a short review

2 reviews on Amazon


If you read the book, please review it.


Barnes & Noble in Tuscaloosa has signed copies.