Tetrapod tracks deeply set in unsuitable substrates: Recent musk oxen in fluid earth (East Greenland) and Pleistocene caprines in aeolian sand (Mallorca)

A plea is made for greater attention to be paid to the ugly traces produced by tetrapods in excessively soft sediments. These rather formless structures are difficult to describe, but they have the potential for providing much information on depositional environments. Two examples are given. (1) The death-march of a musk ox (Ovibos moscatus) that blundered into soil liquified by solif luction in Jameson Land, East Greenland; and (2) Pleistocene trackways made by the extinct ruminant goat Myotragus baleariaus in aeolianites on Mallorca, Balearic Islands. Ichnological evidence shows both to be examples of animals struggling through unsuitable, hazardous substrates. Parallels are drawn with escape structures made by buried invertebrate trace-makers.