Stone flowers explained as dinosaur undertracks: unusual ichnites from the Lower Cretaceous Jiaguan Formation, Qijiang District, Chongqing, China

Two large footprint features preserved as natural casts on the underside of an overhang in the sand-rich Jiaguan Formation of the Tiger tracksite, Qijiang District, Chongqing, China, are shown to be unusual undertrack features of the type reported from other Cretaceous sites in Korea and North America. A combination of radial and concentric, semi-brittle deformation gives these undertracks a "chopped up" or reticulate appearance which sometimes resembles a segmented flower or cauliflower-like morphology. This has given rise to local folklore references to stone flowers. Such features while of undisputed dinosaurian origin clearly demonstrate extramorphological characteristics.