ALAMOGORDO, NEW MEXICO—KRQE reports that a trackway left behind by a small adult and a toddler-aged child more than 10,000 years ago has been found at White Sands National Park, which is located in New Mexico’s northern Chihuahuan Desert. The footprints continue for almost a mile along what was the shore of ancient Lake Otero. Sometimes the child walked on its own, and sometimes it was carried by the adult, whose footprints changed in depth and shape as he or she shifted the child from one hip to the other as they traveled. Prints of mammoth, giant ground sloth, dire wolf, and American lions have also been found in the park. To read about the preserved footprints of a family in northern Italy some 14,000 years ago, go to "Upper Paleolithic Cave Life."
Ice Age Footprints Found in New Mexico
News October 9, 2020
Recommended Articles
Features November/December 2021
Ghost Tracks of White Sands
Scientists are uncovering fossilized footprints in the New Mexico desert that show how humans and Ice Age animals shared the landscape
Off the Grid September/October 2024
Barrancas River Valley, Argentina
Letter from Patagonia July/August 2023
Surviving a Windswept Land
For 13,000 years, hunter-gatherers thrived in some of the world’s harshest environments
Digs & Discoveries July/August 2017
Not So Pearly Whites
-
Features September/October 2020
Walking Into New Worlds
Native traditions and novel discoveries tell the migration story of the ancestors of the Navajo and Apache
(Courtesy Jack Ives/Apachean Origins Project) -
Letter from Alcatraz September/October 2020
Inside the Rock's Surprising History
Before it was an infamous prison, Fort Alcatraz played a key role defending the West Coast
(Hans Blossey/Alamy Stock Photo) -
Artifacts September/October 2020
Neolithic Fishhook
(Svein V. Nielsen, Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo) -
Digs & Discoveries September/October 2020
Siberian Island Enigma
(Andrei Panin)