Credit: Archeology Cymru 
Credit: Sally Wilder 
Credit: Sally Wilder
A FOUR-YEAR-OLD girl has stunned archaeologists after finding an “internationally important” dinosaur footprint on a trip to the supermarket.
Lily Wilder was walking along the coast between Barry and Sully with her father Richard when she spotted what experts from Archaeology Cymru are calling “the finest impression of a 215 million-year-old dinosaur print found in Britain in a decade”.
The perfect print, which her family initially thought may have been created by an artist, is 110mm in length and is classified as a Grallator, a type of dinosaur footprint that identifies a small herding dinosaur.
The specific dinosaur cannot be identified by the footprint alone, but it tells us it would have been a bipedal meat-eater, that may have even eaten other small animals and insects.
“We weren’t even sure it was real. I was imagining an artist had gone down and scratched it out, but I knew dinosaur footprints had been found along that piece of coast before so I just thought I’d ask some people,” said Lily’s mother, Sally Wilder.
“I found this fossil identification page on Facebook and I posted it on there and people went a bit crazy.
“It’s all been so exciting, discovering that it’s actually what they thought it was.”
The print was found on Saturday in The Bendricks, a stretch of coastline between Barry and Sully which has been known to be of paleontological importance.
The Geologists Association South Wales Group have labelled it a site of special scientific interest due to the dinosaur tracks there. They have also named it “the best site in Britain for dinosaur tracks of the Triassic Period and should be preserved for all to see and study.” They urge people not to collect or damage footprints found there.
Karl-James Langford from Archeology Cymru and the National Museum of Wales were put in touch with the Wilder family. On Wednesday the museum sent the geological institute to retrieve the print from the large rock it was found in and the piece is now at the museum.
“It’s so perfect and absolutely pristine, it’s a wonderful piece.” said Karl-James Langford from Archeology Cyrmu.
“I would say it’s internationally important and that is why the museum took it straight away. This is how important it is. I would say it’s the best dinosaur footprint found in the UK in the past 10 years.”
Lily’s interest in dinosaurs has been ignited after finding the footprint and her family are helping her make the most of it.
“Recently we bought her some dinosaur toys so she’s been playing obsessively with dinosaurs all week, said mum Sally.
“But she’s funny because I keep trying to explain the significance of it but she looks at me as if I’m strange. But I’m so excited, but she does talk about it a lot.
“What’s amazing is, if her name goes down as the finder in the museum, it could be her grandchildren going to visit that in the museum one day, and for years and years and generations to come, which is quite amazing.”
Karl-James Langford from Archeology Cyrmu added: “Lily needs all the credit for this find. It’s one she will remember for the rest of her days.”
