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site, more than forty horizons contained hadrosaur and sauropod tracks below the
boundary, and paleontologists estimated that some tracks were made only 300,000
years before the end of the Cretaceous. Alas, there were no more dinosaur tracks in
the Paleogene rocks.
So these few examples show that dinosaurs were indeed alive just before the
meteorite impact and mass extinction, which helps us to better clarify whether
an overall dinosaur extinction was already happening before the impact or not. If
someone does find a dinosaur track above the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary, it
would be a fantastic discovery, worthy of praises and raises. As of now, though, it
justdoesn'tseemlikelythatanydinosaurwalkedforverylongaftertheearthhadits
very bad day, the last of the Cretaceous. But if you think that is heartbreaking, ima-
gine what it must have been like to be that last dinosaur: walking alone and seeking
its own kind but never finding them, its tracks the only ones dotting a desolate and
mostly silent landscape.
