Across South Africa, paleontologists have encountered various mysterious bird-like footprints resembling the tracks of modern-day birds. The tracks date to the Late Triassic and Early Jurassic periods in a new study for PLoS ONE.
During this time, birds and dinosaurs co-existed, and both prints are commonly found preserved on the same surfaces. Researchers are still determining what ancient animal made these tracks. But, the find places bird-like feet with three-toed footprints at 60 million years older than the world's oldest known bird, Protravis texensis.
The prints have sparked debates among paleontologists about the bird-like footprints' species. Over the years, experts have suspected Trisauropodicus, an ichnotaxon that resembles birds' tracks, Anomoepus, an ornithischian dinosaur, and even Gruipeda, as the culprits leaving behind the three-toed tracks.
To pinpoint what could have made the footprints, the team reexamined the original cast material from the Université de Montpellier in France, photographs of 164 fossilized ...
