Blue silicone was poured into a 67-million-year-old hadrosaur footprint at Wyoming’s Zerbst Trackway, prompting owner Kristen Stauffer to shut the site indefinitely after discovering trespass and attempted theft.
The vandal appears to have been trying to make a mold of the track for a replica; Stauffer said she likely would have allowed it if asked, but no one had permission to enter.
The footprint seems not to be permanently damaged, and most of the abandoned silicone has already been removed, though Stauffer said the bigger loss was trust in a site long opened to visitors.
The closure also revives fears from an earlier attack in which someone tried to remove one of the trackway’s extremely rare Saurexallopus prints and destroyed it.
The 7,000-acre family ranch will remain open for other activities and fossil prospecting, but Stauffer said new protections are coming for a trackway that includes one of the few known Tyrannosaurus footprints.