What was the purpose of the long cattle drives?

Answer 1

Cattle have historically, or typically, been raised on marginal lands. This land is not useful for farming and is usually far from population centers. As the nation grew there was a higher demand for beef. Back east all the property was already in production, some for grazing some for crops. This means cattle production needed to increase so it moved to marginal lands or those farther west.

You then had the problem of getting that beef to the market or people. There was no refrigeration so the only choice was to move the cows alive to the rail heads so they could be shipped back east for consumption. Most western railroads went through Chicago so the Chicago Stock Yards became the biggest in the world.

The short answer is this was the only way to get cows from point A to point B. I still use drives of a few miles to get to my corrals or up to 9 miles to go across the ranch.

Answer 2

Two main things:

1. Maintain pasture/range health with moving cattle from one area to another

2. Get a profit off of the cattle that are sold at point B from when they were moved from point A.

Answer 3

If the cattle stayed in one spot too long they would overgraze on the grass and the grass would die so the ranchers would have to keep them moving.