Lower Cretaceous sauropod trackways from Lishui City and an overview of dinosaur dominated track assemblages from Zhejiang Province, China

Abstract

A relatively small number of tetrapod tracksites from Zhejiang Province fills out the fossil record from that region, which is also known to have yielded both saurischian (titanosauriform, coelurosaur) and ornithischian (basal ornithopod, ankylosaurian) body fossils as well as dinosaurian eggs. We use photogrammetry and 3D imaging to reinterpret the sauropod tracks from Lishui City, which revealed the existence of trackways. The track record from three documented sites in Zhejiang Province includes avian and non-avian theropod, sauropod, ornithopod and pterosaur tracks. Previous work showed that the purported new bird ichnospecies Dongyangornipes sinensis is a synonym of Uhangrichnus chuni, while we here consider Pteraichnus dongyangensis as a nomen dubium. Such “provincial ichnotaxonomy” may mask similarities in the ichnofauna across large regions. In fact, we show that the ichnofauna is similar to that found in the Early Cretaceous elsewhere in China.