Britain’s largest dinosaur footprint site has been discovered with hundreds of huge tracks dating back 166 million years
Just a few hundred yards from the busy traffic of the M40, scientists have discovered a very different kind of road.
About 166 million years ago, Britain’s ‘dinosaur highway’ converged with lumbering giants and ferocious predators carving their way across the land.
Researchers from the Universities of Oxford and Birmingham have discovered a vast expanse of quarry floor filled with hundreds of different dinosaur footprints.
Scientists have found five of Britain’s most extensive dinosaur tracks, the longest of which is 150 meters long.
Four of these belong to long-necked herbivores – most likely Cetiosaurus, an 18-meter-long cousin of Diplodocus.
The fifth track was made by a passing Megalosaurus, a ferocious nine-metre-long predator that stalked the swampy lagoons of Britain during the Middle Jurassic.
These uniquely well-preserved tracks reveal some stunning insights into the lives of the long-extinct giants, and even capture the moment two dinosaurs crossed paths.
And researchers say it is “highly likely” that more traces can be found.
Scientists have uncovered Britain’s ‘dinosaur highway’, where giant herbivores and ferocious predators are thought to have passed 166 million years ago
At Dewars Farm Quarry in Oxfordshire, archaeologists have found more than 200 dinosaur footprints on five different tracks
The tracks were found in the Jurassic limestone of the Dewars Farm Quarry in Oxfordshire.
Originally buried under clay, these new tracks were first noticed by quarry worker Gary Johnson when he felt ‘unusual bumps’ as he loosened the clay to reach the quarry floor.
Realizing the importance of the find, experts were contacted and a full excavation of the site began.
In June last year, more than 100 scientists and volunteers carefully uncovered more than 200 fossilized footprints.
In addition to making casts of the prints for further study, the researchers also took more than 20,000 photographs to create a complete 3D model of the site.
This discovery follows previous finds in the area in 1997, when an earlier limestone quarry uncovered more than 40 tracks of sauropods and theropods, a group of bipedal dinosaurs including Tyrannosaurus Rex.
However, the site was buried before the widespread use of digital cameras and drones, so 3D models of the tracks could not be created.
That means this latest discovery is an extremely valuable insight into a vibrant prehistoric ecosystem.
Four of the trackways belong to a long-necked sauropod, most likely the 18-meter-long Cetiosaurus (right). The last remaining set was of a Megalosaurus (left), a ferocious predator that could grow up to nine meters in length
The trackways extend 150 meters along the bottom of the quarry and were discovered when a worker noticed ‘unusual bumps’ in the limestone
About 166 million years ago, before this layer of limestone formed, this part of Oxfordshire was a warm, shallow lagoon above a thick mud bed.
Dr. Duncan Murdock, a palaeontologist from the University of Oxford, told MailOnline: ‘When the feet of the giant animals, some weighing up to 10 tonnes, went into the mud, they left both an imprint of the foot and a rim of displaced mud around the print. .
‘The surface was then flooded and buried with a more clay-rich mud, which preserved the footprints. With time and further burial, these sediments turned into rock.”
That thick mud has retained such incredible detail that scientists can see how the mud was deformed as the dinosaurs’ feet pressed in and out.
‘Unlike fossil bones, finds like these tell us about the behavior of extinct animals,’ says Dr Murdock.
‘The size, shape and position of the footprints can tell us how these dinosaurs moved, their size and speed.’
Each three-toed Megalosaurus track is about 65 cm long and 2.7 meters apart.
Based on these measurements, scientists estimate that this ancient predator would have walked at a speed of about three miles per hour – about the same as the walking speed of a human.
By looking at the size and distribution of the footprints, scientists can figure out how the dinosaurs moved and how fast they were going at the time
Megalosaurus (left) produced footprints 65 cm long and probably moved at a speed of about three miles per hour. The sauropod produced huge footprints measuring 90 cm (right) and is believed to have moved at a similar speed to human walking pace
At one point along the trail, paleontologists even discovered a point where a Megalosaurus and a sauropod intersected.
Based on the disturbances in the mud, scientists think the sauropod moved through first, followed by Megalosaurus some time later.
Dr. Murdock says: ‘Where tracks intersect, we get a glimpse of the potential interactions between different species, such as the carnivorous Megalosaurus and the giant herbivorous sauropods.’
And as exciting as these discoveries are, experts say there is more to be found.
Professor Kirsty Edgar, a micropalaeontologist from the University of Birmingham, told MailOnline that it was ‘highly likely’ that more tracks would be found.
She says: ‘When the animal walks across a surface and leaves an impression in soft sediment, tracks are usually found around rivers, the edges of lake lagoons or more generally on the coast.’
In addition, the Dewars Farm quarry is still actively extracting layers of rock above the surface of the track, meaning there may be further discoveries to come as the Jurassic limestone is uncovered.
Smiths Bletchington, the quarry operators, are working with Natural England to explore options to preserve the site for the future.