the world's largest hadrosaur species with its body length of 16.6 meters discovered in Zhucheng Photo: Sina Weibo

Large dinosaur footprints have recently been discovered in Zhucheng, East China's Shandong Province, a Chinese city that is rich with abundant dinosaur fossils. 

Found during researchers' field studies in this new spring season to the local major fossil remains, the trace fossils were identified as belonging to sauropods - large four-legged herbivore dinosaurs - and theropods, bipedal carnivorous dinosaurs. Along with similar trace fossils that have been discovered in the area, the discovery shows that the region used be home to  many sauropod and theropod dinosaurs. 

Along with the footprints, a relatively complete water-ripple-looking fossil has also been found. According to researchers, it reveals that the place was once a shallow lake. 

"The importance of the footprint discovery is that it may only be the 'tip of the iceberg' of a bigger find," Zhu Maoyan, a paleontologist, told the Global Times. The two types of fossils discovered in Zhucheng are very rare in China.

"In some cases, there will be skeleton fossils discovered after footprints are identified. The stratum related to the discovery is also valuable for analyzing the time period, environment and so on."

The geological stratum of the site has been preliminarily identified by researchers as dating to the early Cretaceous. 

According to an explanation from Chen Shuqing, chief of the scientific research and popular science department of the local dinosaur culture research center, a number of dinosaur fossil sites have been discovered in 2022 in Zhucheng, proving that the location once provided dense vegetation and abundant lake water resources for dinosaurs in the Mesozoic era. 

The city of Zhucheng has long been dubbed the "dragon city" due to its valuable dinosaur resources. Since the 1960s, more than 30 dinosaur fossil sites, covering an area of nearly 1,000 square kilometers in total, have been found in the city. 

More than 25,000 dinosaur fossils have been found in the city. One of the city's most prominent dinosaur discoveries was a fossil of the world's largest hadrosaur species with its body length of 16.6 meters and height of 9 meters. 

"The abundant paleontological resources are invaluable. They have to be preserved for research. For example, researchers can make a replication of the discovered footprints to further study things such as the migration and distribution of such creatures," Zhu noted. 

"Also, such resources can be used in public education and tourism."