Minisauripus
Minisauripus is an ichnogenus of theropod dinosaurs from the Early Cretaceous of East Asia. The trackmaker of Minisauripus would have been among the smallest known non-avian dinosaurs. This ichnogenus contains two named ichnospecies from China, M. chuanzhuensis and M. zhenshuonani, with several indeterminate ichnospecies known from China, South Korea and Japan.Discovery
The type ichnospecies M. chuanzhuensis was first described in 1995 from the Early Cretaceous Jiaguan Formation of Sichuan, China. The second ichnospecies M. zhensuonani was described in 2008 from the Tianjialou Formation of Shandong, China. Trace fossils from the Haman Formation of South Korea were referred to as M. cf. zhenshuonani or M. cf. chuanzhuensis. Other trace fossils attributed to M. isp. were discovered from the Feitianshan Formation of China, the Jinju Formation of South Korea and the Kitadani Formation of Japan.Classification
About 95 tracks have been attributed to Minisauripus, and over 80% of them were less than long. The abundance of such small footprints might suggest that the trackmaker of Minisauripus was a small non-avian theropod, not a juvenile of a larger taxon. The Minisauripus tracks show three distinct toes, unlike the tracks of similar-sized small dromaeosaurids such as Dromaeosauriformipes, which are didactyl, with the recurved claw on the second toe being held off the ground and thus not preserved in the trackway.