New dinosaur footprints exposed in rocks of the W essex F ormation, L ower C retaceous, at S andown, I sle of W ight, southern E ngland

During F ebruary 2007, storm waves removed sufficient sand from the foreshore at S andown beach on the I sle of W ight to expose a number of L ower C retaceous interbedded fluvial sand sheets and floodplain mudstones from the upper part of the W essex F ormation terrestrial sequence. The sand bodies have been described before, and exhibit a number of water generated ripple marks, as well as bioturbation by burrowing organisms. These sand bodies and a fossiliferous limestone have resulted in the area being designated as a R egionally I mportant G eological/ G eomorphological S ite. The mudstones show colour mottling as a result of pedogenic alteration in changing aerobic/anaerobic conditions. From F ebruary until the end of M ay 2007 sufficient exposure of the bedrock on the foreshore occurred to allow identification of a number of dinosaur footprints. Tridactyl and polydactyl prints with a range of sizes were clearly visible with possible ornithopod, theropod, sauropod, and ankylosaur origins. Within the intervening mudstones, preservation of the footprints takes the form of grey–blue infills in red mud, and brown silty infills in red mud (convex hyporeliefs), as well as occasional raised gritty footprint casts. On the sandstone units, the preservation is in the form of raised sandy casts. The greatest variety in terms of size and type are in the mudstone units on the seaward side of the I sle of W ight Z oo (The G ranite F ort). These prints are from an area that does not appear to have been previously reported but which requires further investigation. © 2014 The Linnean Society of London, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society , 2014, 113 , 758–769.