Residents of San Juan de los Plátanos, a small community in Apatzingán, Michoacán, spotted tracks of "giant animals" in a stream bed and did the right thing: they reported them to Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH). The institute has now confirmed at least 50 fossilized dinosaur footprints on a sedimentary rock platform at the river's edge, spread across roughly 40 square metres — and says the trackway could stretch further once more of the site is examined.
The prints measure between 12 and 48 centimetres long and up to 30 centimetres wide. Based on their shape, toe count and depth, INAH paleontologist Raymundo Cervantes Barriga attributes them to three dinosaur families: a large carnivorous theropod up to four metres tall, possibly a tyrannosaurid; a smaller raptor-like predator (dromaeosaurid) around two metres tall; and a duck-billed herbivore (hadrosaurid) that could stand four metres high. All three lived about 65 million years ago, in the Late Cretaceous, when this part of Michoacán likely had water sources where different species came to drink and feed.
Documentation began on 21 October, with a team carrying out photogrammetry, mold-making and geological sampling of the rock. Since only part of the site has been reviewed, the footprint count is expected to grow. Mexico's Secretary of Culture, Claudia Curiel de Icaza, credited the local tip-off and promised the site will be studied and protected with scientific rigor.
Why it matters for travellers: this is Michoacán's fourth dinosaur track site, after Playa Azul in Lázaro Cárdenas, El Aguaje in Aguililla, and the Tiquicheo–Tuzantla border area. Mexico has just over 30 registered footprint sites overall, concentrated in states like Puebla, Coahuila, Oaxaca, Chihuahua, Sonora, Durango and Michoacán — so a budding "dino tourism" circuit is quietly taking shape beyond the beaches. Researchers also hope the find will lift a region that faces social challenges, especially for local children who now live beside a genuine Cretaceous record.
For now the site is an active research area rather than an attraction, so access may be restricted or informal. If you're travelling through the Tierra Caliente region, keep an eye on INAH announcements — protected footprints like these tend to become community-led visits or museum exhibits once stabilized, as they have elsewhere in Mexico.
