Mention the word “fossils” to people and most will probably think of bones. Of course, body fossils make up a large part of the global fossil record. But humans and other species leave their mark in other ways too – for instance, their tracks. The study of these fossil tracks and traces is called ichnology.
I am an ichnologist. In 2008 my colleagues and I launched the Cape South Coast Ichnology Project to study a 350km stretch of South Africa’s coastline. We’ve since identified more than 350 vertebrate tracksites, most of them in cemented dunes called aeolianites that date back to the Pleistocene Epoch (also known as the Ice Age), which began about 2.6 million years ago and ended 11,700 years ago.
At a global level it is rare to find fossilised hominin tracks. There is something very special about them: a fossil trackway looks as if it could have been created yesterday, and the fact that our own ancestors would have created such tracks fills them with extra meaning. It’s always a thrill for researchers to find them.
