TyrannosaurusRex Posted March 7, 2015 Share Posted March 7, 2015 There is a fossil trackway from sauropods located in Bandera tx on the Medina river. I have been to see them twice and the last time I noticed they had faded significantly since the first time I saw them. There are in the park. Is there anything we can do to help preserve them? Or even talk to someone to come out and take a look at them? Maybe cast them? I am just getting very concerned about them disappearing forever. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raggedy Man Posted March 7, 2015 Share Posted March 7, 2015 Probably not unless the park cares as I'm sure it's illegal to remove them. You can also contact the local university and see what they have to say. 1 ...I'm back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TyrannosaurusRex Posted March 7, 2015 Author Share Posted March 7, 2015 I'm sure it is illegal. I need to see about contacting the university. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Auspex Posted March 7, 2015 Share Posted March 7, 2015 It is possible that they have already been cast. Did you ask at the park? 1 "There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley >Paleontology is an evolving science. >May your wonders never cease! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jesuslover340 Posted March 7, 2015 Share Posted March 7, 2015 We have the same problem in Kenton, Oklahoma-dinosaur tracks are now reduced to six prints or so due to weathering, from forty+ a few years ago =\ 1 "Let us therefore follow after the things which make for peace, and things wherewith one may edify another."-Romans 14:19 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Herb Posted March 7, 2015 Share Posted March 7, 2015 (edited) Maybe you can talk the park into building some kind of weather proof glass topped frame around them to preserve them. Edited March 7, 2015 by Herb 1 "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence"_ Carl Sagen No trees were killed in this posting......however, many innocent electrons were diverted from where they originally intended to go. " I think, therefore I collect fossils." _ Me "When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."__S. Holmes "can't we all just get along?" Jack Nicholson from Mars Attacks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erose Posted March 8, 2015 Share Posted March 8, 2015 I'm pretty sure those tracks have been documented. There is a paper on Texas Dino prints out of Baylor University that has some on the Medina River. To what level of detail they were mapped and recorded I do not know. The Glen Rose Formation is well known for footprints. There are numerous sites*all over Central Texas that are already known and new ones being exposed on a regular basis. Unfortunately that formation has many soft layers that just do not stand up to the elements. The small section of tracks from the Paluxy River that ended up at the University of Texas Memorial Museum are being restored at huge expense because the original mounting was so poor that moisture has rotted the limestone, even inside the "protective" enclosure where they sat for decades. Get out your camera, take along a tape measure or meter stick and start documenting them. That may the best one could expect. * for fun go to Google Earth. Starting at the Texas town of Blanco in Hays County zoom in to a reasonable level and follow the Blanco river west a handful of miles. It will wander a bit but eventually you should come to an area with numerous sauropod tracks visible where they cross the river. Let us know if you see them. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opisthotriton Posted March 8, 2015 Share Posted March 8, 2015 Get out your camera, take along a tape measure or meter stick and start documenting them. That may the best one could expect. As erose said, the best thing you can do to help (besides also contacting the local university or museum) is to take photos. LOTS of photos. Not just a few nice photos of each track, but hundreds of photos of each track and the whole trackway, all taken at slightly different angles. Take a photo, move a couple inches, take another photo, repeat. This massive photo bomb can then be used in photogrammetry to produce a 3D model of the trackway. Computer programs and digital cameras have both gotten so good that you don't need a fancy 3D scanner to make a great 3D model. Anyone can photo bomb (take hundreds of photos) an object, and then you can use the photos in a photogrammetry program yourself, or you can give the photos to someone else, like the university, so they can make a 3D model anytime they like. You have preserved the data. Be sure to use a scale bar that is visible in every photo (it's ok if it's missing in a few), and take the photos in focus and at the highest resolution you can. Photogrammetry is becoming one of the best ways to preserve the data of large tracksites that are impossible to collect and will only get damaged over time. Brent Breithaupt and Nephra Matthews have been big pioneers of photogrammetry for tracksites in the western US, and now paleontologists all over the world are using photogrammetry on their tracksites. And if you have any fears that your photos wouldn't be "good enough", here's a great article about a lost Paluxy River trackway that was digitally 3D reconstructed using photos that were 70 years old! And they only had 17 photos! http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0093247 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TyrannosaurusRex Posted March 10, 2015 Author Share Posted March 10, 2015 As erose said, the best thing you can do to help (besides also contacting the local university or museum) is to take photos. LOTS of photos. Not just a few nice photos of each track, but hundreds of photos of each track and the whole trackway, all taken at slightly different angles. Take a photo, move a couple inches, take another photo, repeat. This massive photo bomb can then be used in photogrammetry to produce a 3D model of the trackway. Computer programs and digital cameras have both gotten so good that you don't need a fancy 3D scanner to make a great 3D model. Anyone can photo bomb (take hundreds of photos) an object, and then you can use the photos in a photogrammetry program yourself, or you can give the photos to someone else, like the university, so they can make a 3D model anytime they like. You have preserved the data. Be sure to use a scale bar that is visible in every photo (it's ok if it's missing in a few), and take the photos in focus and at the highest resolution you can. Photogrammetry is becoming one of the best ways to preserve the data of large tracksites that are impossible to collect and will only get damaged over time. Brent Breithaupt and Nephra Matthews have been big pioneers of photogrammetry for tracksites in the western US, and now paleontologists all over the world are using photogrammetry on their tracksites. And if you have any fears that your photos wouldn't be "good enough", here's a great article about a lost Paluxy River trackway that was digitally 3D reconstructed using photos that were 70 years old! And they only had 17 photos! http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0093247 I will do my best. I will also see about permission for making some high quality casts. What is so sickening is they ripped about a dozen to pieces to build a bridge. Stuff like this needs to be preserved for future generations to see. One day people may not even remember the tracks ever existed. But like I said I will do my best. Does Bandera have a university to contact? If not I will try Boerne or San Antonio. It does need to be taken care of. 1 of the tracks is about 3 1/2' across. Last time I went it was filled with rank water and cigarette butts. I always try to clean them out and it usually results with cut hands or glass chips embedded in my hands. I know there's at least 50 tracks there. But in 1 year who knows? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erose Posted March 14, 2015 Share Posted March 14, 2015 Contact the Witte Museum in San Antonio. Also the trackways at Government Canyon were being recorded by some group(?) and they may also be interested in these. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tooth_claw Posted March 15, 2015 Share Posted March 15, 2015 Second on the photogrammetry, it really does work well. A note of caution regarding physically preserving the tracks- sometimes it is impossible to do so. A colleague of mine has a great example of fossil trackways that completely eroded away in a few short years after discovery, his photos of them are the only record that they existed at all (luckily, in place of the old trackway a new trackway was revealed which also soon eroded away so he got double value from the site). Sometimes you cannot save a specimen but you can (and should!) record enough data to reconstruct it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Auspex Posted March 15, 2015 Share Posted March 15, 2015 Without erosion, the tracks would never have been revealed (heck, since they were made in mud/sand/soft soil, without erosion they would have never been made!). It is because of the forces of erosion that anyone got to see them, measure them, plot them, photograph them...and making erosion cease on demand is a pretty tall order. Take advantage of this serendipitous timing and document everything! "There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley >Paleontology is an evolving science. >May your wonders never cease! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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