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Coprolite Trace Fossils
Description: The larger specimen of coprolite at left from the unknown animal (perhaps a dinosaur) is 1 1/4″ wide X 3/4″ thick X 1 3/4″ long. It has a relatively smooth surface. The smaller coprolite piece is about 1″ diameter X 3/4″ high. It has a number of small protuberances that could be interpreted as fossilized plant seeds.
The dinosaur coprolite replica (at right) is 3″ wide X 2 1/2″ thick X 4″ long. All of the animal coprolite specimens resemble feces deposits from living animals. The fish coprolite is 3/32″ diameter X 1″ overall length. It is located in the same plane as the fossilized fish at the top of the matrix (see blue arrow).
Location: Various locations in North America. The fish coprolite is from the Green River formation in Wyoming.
Interpretation: The fossilized remains of feces are called coprolites. Generally speaking coprolites are not found close by to skeletal animal fossils. However, one exception is that fish coprolite is very common alongside fish fossils in the limestone layers of the Green River formation. In the case of dinosaur coprolites there is no agreement among experts about how to identify them. Some coprolites originally identified as being from dinosaurs were later attributed to crocodiles and other animals.
Ignoring the problems in correlating coprolites to their sources, it is generally agreed that only rapid burial under water-laden sediments can explain their existence. These are the conditions we can expect were in place during the Flood that is described in the book of Genesis.
#DF6, DR11
Gastrolith Trace Fossil
Description: The gastrolith stone in the photo above is 2″ wide X 2 1/4″ long X 1 1/2″ high with an irregular shape and a smooth surface.
Location: Morrison formation of Colorado.
Interpretation: Gastroliths (Greek: Stomach stone) are rocks and pebbles ingested into the stomach, or elsewhere in the intestinal tract, to help some animals with digestion. They are found in living animals today such as crocodiles, alligators and some birds. Since the early 1960s paleontologists have believed that certain groupings of stones found within or near fossilized dinosaur remains were used by the dinosaurs in this manner.
There is little doubt that some dinosaurs used gastroliths to aid in digestion. What is doubtful is that all of the multitudes of polished rocks promoted as dinosaur gastroliths are authentic. Some fraudulent stones on the market today are likely to have been polished using mechanical means. The gastrolith in the photo above is thought to be authentic for the following reasons:
- It was found together with other similar rocks over 50 years ago and has been in the author’s collection continuously since.
- It is rounded and polished in the manner characteristic of authenticated museum dinosaur gastrolith specimens. Dents have been smoothened just like the more exposed surfaces.
- It has dents and scratches characteristic of those expected from the stone coming in contact with the sharp corners of other freshly swallowed stones.
#DF13
Dinosaur Footprint
Description: The dinosaur cast footprint is 3″ wide X 4″ long X 1/2″ maximum depth. The matrix is 5 1/4″ wide X 5 1/2″ long.
Location: From a footprint found in Massachusetts.
Interpretation: Many dinosaur footprints in stone have been discovered over the years, but dinosaurs are not found standing in the footprints so it is not easy to correlate a footprint to a particular dinosaur. The footprint above is obviously of a small to medium sized three-toed individual, but other than the location and rock layer where it was found, that is the extent of what can be determined with any certainty.
Creationists and evolutionists have a number of theories for how the footprints and associated trackways were formed, but why would it be easier to believe these trace fossils are one hundred million years old rather than 4,500 years old? Which belief requires more faith?
#DR7
Dinosaur Footprints
Description: Photo of dinosaur and crocodile tracks at Dinosaur Ridge near Morrison, Colorado. The footprints have been colored by water-diluted charcoal mix for visibility.
Description: The Magnoavipes cast was taken from a footprint of the many examples found at the main track site at Dinosaur Ridge. The footprint is 10″ wide X 9″ long X 3/4″ maximum depth. The matrix is 11 1/2″ wide X 9 3/16″ long.
Location: Dinosaur Ridge near Morrison, Colorado.
Interpretation: Magnnovipes caneeri is the genus/species name that has been applied to the footprint believed to have been made by a relatively small Tyrant Bipedal (theropod) dinosaur.
At the main Dinosaur Ridge track site, footprints from three different types of dinosaurs and a type of crocodile have been identified. At this site at least 350 individual tracks were made by about 40 individuals, with the majority thought to have been made by a Duck-Billed kind of dinosaur.
The conditions that preserved these tracks are much more likely to have been from a catastrophe than from uniformitarian conditions over deep time. The millions of dinosaur footprints scattered over the surface of the earth exist today because of the special conditions of the Flood at the time of Noah!
#DR23
Trilobite Tracks
Description: The slate slab is 2 3/8″ wide X 2 3/4″ high X 1/8″ thick. The trilobite tracks cover the total distance of 2 3/4″ or the total height of the slab. The trackway is nominally 1/2″ wide and there are about 28 prints per side.
Location: Hale formation in Washington County, Arkansas.
Interpretation: The author does not know, nor is it likley that anyone knows, the genus of the trilobite that made this fossil trackway since trilobites are seldom, if ever, fossilized with their tracks. If it is assumed that the trilobite was about 1/2″ wide there would be a large number of genera that could fit the tracks. Trilobite tracks are sometimes given the genus name of Cruziana.
#OF18
Dinosaur Eggs
Description: The replica dinosaur egg (top) is 5 1/8″ wide X 6 1/4″ high. It is embedded in a portion of the rock matrix in which it was discovered. It is thought to be from a Duck-Billed dinosaur. The lower replica dinosaur egg is 2 3/8″ wide X 6″ long X 2″ high at the large end. This egg is oblong and has been crushed about 1/2″ deep diagonally along it length. It is thought to be from a Tyrant Bipedal dinosaur.
Location: Duck-Billed egg from China, Tyrant Bipedal egg from the Gobi Desert of Mongolia.
Interpretation: Dinosaur eggs are similar to dinosaur footprints in that it is difficult to know for sure which eggs go with which dinosaur kind. The eggs found so far are mostly nearly spherical or oblong in shape like those shown above.
Evolutionists envision some sort of slow fossilization process for these eggs. Creation scientists are largely restricted to putting forth speculations, since no one was there to witness the process, but agree that rapid burial is a more satisfactory explanation that matches the expected results of the global Flood.
Dinosaur eggs had hard shells like birds rather than the leathery shells used by many of today’s reptiles. This is evidence that indicates dinosaurs were not the same created kind as reptiles.
#DR16, DR6
Dinosaur Egg Shell Fragment
Description: The egg shell fragment is 3/16″ thick X 1 1/4″ X 1 1/4″ and is part of a Long-Necked dinosaur egg.
Location: Argentina.
Interpretation: Dinosaur egg shell fragments are much more common than are complete dinosaur eggs, but identifying the kind of dinosaur that an egg shell fragment came from is largely a speculative exercise. The conditions of a year-long worldwide Flood could be expected to fossilize eggs, just as they made possible millions of other invertebrate, vertebrate, plant and trace fossils.
#DF2
Raindrop Trace Fossils
Description: The concave raindrops (top) range in size from 1/16″ to 3/8″ diameter. There are about 12 raindrop impressions per square inch of mudstone surface. The convex raindrops (lower) range in size from 1/16″ to 1/4″ diameter. The matrix size for the top piece is 9″ wide X 6 3/4″ high X 3/4″ thick. The lower piece is 7″ wide X 4 5/8″ high X 5/16″ thick.
Location: El Pueblo track site in the Sangre de Christo formation of northeastern New Mexico.
Interpretation: These trace fossils are from a location where numerous animal tracks have also been discovered. The secular explanation for the animal footprints, and these raindrop trace fossil impressions in the New Mexico rock record is, “a major terrestrial transference flood event.” Another secular answer for these fossils is, “repetitious and intensive rainfall episodes.” According to the evolutionary paradigm, these events took place hundreds of millions of years ago.
The biblical creationist interpretation is that these concave and convex raindrops were made during the Genesis Flood just 4,500 years ago. Scientific experiments witnessed by the author prove that mud can turn into rock relatively quickly and does not take millions of years. So, if uniformitarianism is valid, why don’t raindrops regularly freeze into rock today? Why can’t we find in the rock evidences of every monsoon over the past fifty years? The author believes it is because these fossils were made only under the very unusual circumstances of the global Flood. Secularists continue to accept more and more catastrophe into their explanations for the causes of what is found in the earth’s crust, but their atheistic religion that rejects the accuracy of the Bible blocks them from considering a global Flood.
#OF29-1,2
Water Ripple Trace Fossils
Description: The mudstone specimen shows traces of water-caused multi-directional waves. One wave trace is oriented at about 15 degrees off horizontal and the other wave trace is close to vertical. The distance between ridges is 2″ center-to-center for the horizontal wave trace, and 1 1/2″ center-to-center for the vertical wave trace. The height of the traces is about 3/16″. The rock piece is 6 1/2″ wide X 7 1/4″ high X 5/8″ thick.
Location: El Puelblo site in the Sangre de Cristo formation of northeastern New Mexico.
Interpretation: The movement of mineral particles in a current creates ripple marks on the sediment surfaces over which they travel. Ripple marks form in various shapes, sizes and patterns that result from the type of water or wind action that acts on them. A good laboratory for studying the formation of ripples is an ocean beach.
Secularists are familiar with the many variables that cause all the different ripple designs, but they do not have good explanations for why ripples are frozen in the rock record. The biblical creationist believes they are there because of the unusual conditions and actions of the Flood at the time of Noah that are described in the Bible.
#OF29-3
Description: High relief water ripple marks are 3/4″ to 1 1/4″ on centers. Slab is 14 1/2″ wide X 11 7/8″ high X 1 3/8″ thick.
Location: Passaic formation in New Jersey.
#OF31
Description: Multi-directional ripple marks in wet beach sand (note man’s shoe prints for scale).
Location: Oregon coast.
Interpretation: Today, these ripple marks are never permanent and will be gone with the next wave or high tide.
Description: Fossilized ripple marks in the sandstone at Dinosaur Ridge near Denver, Colorado.
Fossil Boring Casts
Description: Trace fossil worm boring castings along the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon in Arizona.
Description: The block of fossil Toredo clam borings is 3 1/4″ wide X 2 5/8″ high X 1 1/4″ thick. The fossil borings range from 1/16″ wide to 1/4″ wide and the longest borings are 3/4″ long. There is very little left of the wood in which the clams bored.
Location: Empire formation in Coos County, Oregon.
Interpretation: These borings were made by a bivalve called the Toredo clam. The Toredo is called a “shipworm” by mariners because of the havoc they wreak, even today, on wooden boats and docks. The borings made in the fossil are preserved by minerals in the sediment that in-filled the bored holes.
Because the clams that made the fossilized borings have not been preserved, this is a trace fossil. There is little if any difference between the Toredo of today and the ones that made te fossil borings in the photo above prior to the Genesis Flood about 4,500 years ago.
#OF23
Worm Burrow Casts
Description: The trace fossil is 5/16″ maximum diameter X 2 1/8″ long. The matrix is 2″ wide X 3 1/2″ long X 1 1/16″ thick. The cast has been naturally stained with iron minerals.
Location: Stewartville formation near Greenleafton, Minnesota.
Interpretation: The processes for strata deposition and fossil burial and preservation that provided this worm burrow cast were different from those in place today. Worm burrows are seldom, if ever, fossilized by the processes we observe in the present. The principle of uniformitarianism (“the present is the key to the past”) that is foundational to secular geology and paleontology is not supported by observational science.
#OF24
Description: The trace fossil is 9/16″ diameter X 5 9/16″ long. The cast was broken in two and has been glued back together.
Location: Decorah Shale near Rochester, Minnesota.
Interpretation: The extent of worm burrow fossils in sediments indicates a process whereby the worms were able to make their normal compliment of burrows in relatively soft materials. The environment where they were living was rapidly and completely buried, the animals were destroyed, and the spaces infilled with other materials all before erosion and other processes could destroy any trace of them.
#OF25
