Brontopodus - The Huge Sauropod known only from Footprints Re-Posting in English - coloring page

 Welcome to my free coloring pages blog.

Today's new drawing is of a huge Sauropod that is only known from its unique footprints. 

There are over 1000 free coloring pages on this blog.

NOTE to English readers:   I will be posting this in multiple languages...

because Brontopodus tracks were found in multiple countries.

This is the reposting in English. 

Scroll down to read it in Chinese, Portuguese, Korean, and French. 

Brontopodus by a River

Brontopodus is known from footprints in many parts of the world.  It has been named its own Genus because the manus or front footprints have 4 toes on each foot (hand).  There are no known Sauropods that had 4 toes on their front feet.  All known Sauropods had 3 toes on their manus or front feet.  This led to the identification of the new Genus.  There are apparently two species of Brontopodus known. Brontopodus birdi or birdii is the name for the species found along the East Coast, Gulf Coast, and in Texas, USA.  Brontopodus plagnensis is known from many tracks in France.  

Brontopodus tracks are found in Korea and in France.  Large fossilized Sauropod footprints in Australia, the USA, Portugal, Switzerland, and China also seem to be from Brontopodus.  This is very interesting because the multiple sites indicate that this huge animal was very successful and spread to many parts of the planet.  Of course, the continents were more connected then than they are now.  But how is it that we humans have yet to find a fossilized Brontopodus skeleton when it lived all over the world?  Where are the fossilized skeletons of Brontopodus?  

Species that are known from only trace fossils like footprints are called "ichnospecies."  By the way, "Brontopodus" means "Thunder Foot!"  (or maybe thunder feet)  Bronto in Greek means thunder and pod means foot.  Perhaps the paleontologist who named this dinosaur was thinking of Brotonsaurus (that means thunder lizard).  But Brontosaurus' name has been replaced by Apatosaurus.  Now we can think of this 37 ton monster as walking and the sound their feet made would be like thunder.  Sauropods are known to have lived in herds.  Imagine a whole herd of these huge dinosaurs walking by.  It would sound like thunder!

Brontopodus was a very BIG dinosaur.  It was a type of Sauropod.  Sauropods were the long-necked dinosaurs that grew to enormous sizes. Based on the size of the footprints, and the estimation of similar-sized Diplodocids, (like Diplodocus) it is thought that Brontopodus was around 87 feet or 26.5 meters long.  It is estimated that Brontopodus weighed around 37 tons.  

Some Brontopodus footprints had fossilized bird tracks around them so the drawing has birds and Pterosaurs.  (Yes there were birds around in the Late Jurassic Period.)  The bird tracks could have been made by species like Archaeopteryx or Caihong. Brontopodus lived in the late Jurassic and possibly even into the Early Cretaceous Period.  That would be around 150 up to 110 million years ago.   

The longest ever found fossilized Sauropod dinosaur tracks are in France near the village of Plagne in the Jura mountains.  They are tracks made by Brontopodus plagnensis. The tracks are around 150 meters or 492 feet long.  Of course, each footprint is not that big.  The footprints just go on and on for 150 meters.  The dinosaur walked in mud and left footprints and the mud turned to stone so we have the trace fossils. 

This drawing, in printable form, can be found by clicking on the button labeled "Paleontology."  Then scroll down to the bottom of the section labeled "Mesozoic Drawings" ...for this new drawing.  It will be listed in the "Mesozoic Era" drawings. But click on the button labeled . . . .  Paleontology.