ON THE SEDENTARY IMPRESSION OF THE ANIMAL 

 WHOSE TRAIL IS KNOWN AS CLIMACTICHNITES 



BY JAY B. WOODWORTH 



In the course of an examination of the Pleistocene deposits 

 of the Mooers quadrangle, including the township of Mooers, 

 in Clinton county, N. Y., in the summer of 1902, I had my atten- 

 tion called to certain trails on the Potsdam sandstone in that 

 town which are remarkable for their distinctness and association 

 with terminal impressions not heretofore described. Having 

 seen the trails of Climactichnites on a flagstone in the main 

 street of the village of Mooers, I was led to inquire for the quarry 

 whence the stone was derived, and, though I did not learn whence 

 the slab came, I was informed by the postmaster of the tracks 

 which it is the object of this paper to describe. 



The trails (Climactichnites) described in this paper occur in 

 the town of Mooers on the west side of the Mooers branch of 

 the Delaware and Hudson Railroad a few rods south of what 

 is known locally as Bidwell's crossing, on the land of Mr B. H. 

 Palmer, at the first rock cut in the railroad north of Sciota 

 and distant from that station somewhat less than 2 miles. The 

 Potsdam sandstone is here practically horizontal and is exposed 

 in the rock cut as a badly shaken, irregularly splitting series of 

 prevailingly light colored sandstones. The track layer is exposed 

 in the adjoining field in the wave-swept trough between two of 

 the small beach ridges of the postglacial marine stage of the 

 Champlain valley. The track layer, where its edge is exposed, 

 has a thickness of 8 inches; it is traversed by several rudely 

 parallel joints cutting all of the longer trails. The area ex- 

 posed at the time of my visit was about 50 feet long and varying 

 in width from a yard to over two yards. 



The trails appear to have been first noted by the present 

 owner of the land, who states that he cleared away some of the 

 surface debris several years ago. Locally the trails are spoken 

 of as those " serpents/' and the impressions associated with 

 them as " human footprints.'' A visit to the locality confirmed 

 the surmise that the " serpent trails " are the ladderlike 

 tracks known as Climactichnites. What, so far as I know how- 



