Amazonian Lower Cretaceous North Tocantins State (Brazil) dinosaur track site: conservation significance

• Autores: Tavares, Lanuze Fabielly; de Valais, Silvina; Alves, Yuri Modesto; Candeiro, Carlos Roberto A.
• Año de publicación: 2015
• Idioma: inglés
• Tipo de recurso: artículo
• Materia: Ciencias Exactas y Naturales; Conservation; Dinosaur Track Site; Tocantins State; Brazil; Ciencias Exactas y Naturales
• Institución: Universidad Nacional de Río Negro

Fil: Tavares, Lanuze Fabielly. Campus de Porto Nacional, Laboratório de Paleobiologia, Universidade Federal do Tocantins, Palmas; Brasil.
Fil: de Valais, Silvina. Universidad Nacional de Rio Negro. Instituto de Investigaciones en Paleobiologia y Geologia. Río Negro, Argentina.
Fil: Alves, Yuri Modesto. Departamento de Biología, Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro; Brasil.
Fil: Candeiro, Carlos Roberto. Campus de Ituiutaba, Laboratory de Geologia, Núcleo de Análise Ambiental em Geociencias, Universidade Federal de Uberlandia; Brasil.
On the left bank of the Tocantins River, near Sa˜o Domingos, State of Tocantins, northern Brazil, there are at least six vertebrate trackways from the Barremian Corda Formation (Parnaı´ba Basin) first reported by Leonardi (BuenosAires 1:215–222, 1980) and assigned to iguanodontid dinosaurs. Later, these trackways were reassigned as belonging to sauropods. Until 2011, this locality was subject to river floods during seasonal rain cycles. Since then, the amount of water on the flatstones was substantially modified due the implantation of the ‘‘Usina Hidroeletrica de Estreito’’, which has a dam 160 km upstream from the trackways locality. Recent fieldwork in the area has revealed that only a part of four original trackways is still preserved. The specimens, with poor to moderate preservation, are represented by large semicircular pes imprints lacking digital impressions mostly overlapping the hand print, which supports a sauropodian origin. Here, the authors consider and suggest geotourism as an important tool to protect and preserve the Sa˜o Domingos’ footprints.
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