The Hunterian Museum at the University of Glasgow may hold the world's smallest dinosaur footprints in its collections. The 165 million-year-old three-toed footprint was found in February 2004 on the Isle of Skye by Curator of Palaeontology, Dr Neil Clark. Measuring only 1.78cm, it is smaller than a five-penny coin.

The footprint appears to belong to a young dinosaur similar to Coelophysis, and is imprinted onto the footprint of an adult dinosaur of the same kind. The chance discovery was only made when Dr Clark returned from Scotland's Dinosaur Isle where he was researching other dinosaur footprints with the curator of the Staffin Museum, Dugald Ross and fellow researcher Paul Booth of Pitlochry.

During the Middle Jurassic, the Isle of Skye was not as it is now, but looked more like what the Camargue region of southern France is today. Dinosaur walked in family groups along the shores of large lagoons, leaving behind their footprints in the soft, wet sand. Meat eating dinosaurs prowled in search of their prey, teaching their young the skills they would need as they grew older. A baby dinosaur, just hatched, would follow in the footsteps of its parent, perhaps only a short distance from the nest.

Finding the world's smallest dinosaur footprint 165 million years later has revealed the unique interaction between adult and young meat-eating dinosaurs for the first time.

Dr Clark said: 'I collected the other, larger footprint on a piece of sandstone, but became aware of the tiny footprint when I started to measure the adult print. I didn't realise what I had and I certainly never expected to find such a small footprint. It had always been assumed that dinosaurs of this type remained within, or near to, their nests until they were much larger."

The size of the footprint suggests that it belonged to a dinosaur that had only hatched out from its egg days before taking its first few faltering steps. While young dinosaur footprints are already known from the same site on the Isle of Skye, nothing this small has ever been found before.

Dr Clark explained: "The dinosaur that made this footprint was probably only 20cm in size which is about the same size as a sparrow. It would have looked very much like a dinosaur called Coelophysis that is known from the Triassic and Lower Jurassic (220-190 million years ago) of North America. A similar animal is now known to have existed in Scotland 170 million years ago."

Research continues on these exciting discoveries and it is hoped that further evidence will reveal the dinosaur that made these footprints and perhaps where it nested.

The footprint will be on display at the Hunterian Museum from 8 June 2004 when Dr Clark will be giving a public 'lunch-time' talk on the discovery at 12:45pm.

Media Relations Office (media@gla.ac.uk)

You are invited to send a photographer to the Hunterian Museum at 10am on Tuesday 8 June to view the casts of the tiny footprints and / or attend Dr Clark?s presentation.

Please let the Press Office know if you plan to attend on 0141 330 3535 / 3683

Images are also available from the Press Office.

First published: 7 June 2004