Cattle drives in the United States
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Cattle drives were a regular event, and Texas cattle were trailed to California as early as the 1850s. A cattle drive could be more than a 1,000 mile movement of cattle to cattle markets that paid higher prices; thus, in California a steer bought for $5 in Texas might fetch $100. Such drives typically consisted of a wrangler, a cook, and a cowboy for every 250 to 300 cattle. A wrangler was employed to care for extra horses. The cook drove the chuck wagon and set up camp.
After the Civil War, the north had a huge demand for meat and cowboys met this demand by driving cattle north. Gradually, herding cattle north became more difficult since the land that the cattle had to cross was being farmed--and fenced--by people under the Homestead Act. Railroads extending to Texas also diminished the need for drives. By the late 1880s, the Chisholm Trail had almost shut down.[citation needed]
The cattle drives eventually spread to the states of Kansas, Wyoming, Montana, Colorado, and Arizona, with the trails shifting west over time to skirt the western edge of settlement. This was to prevent quarantines against cattle-borne diseases.
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[edit] Problems
These drives faced hardships that could include Indian raids, cattle theft, stampede, weather (such as a spring blizzard), and also lack of water. Barbed wire also became widely used toward the end of this period, and the cattle drives nearly ceased to exist due to a limited open range left for the cattle to graze and for the drive to go through. Also, many cattle drives were checked at borders for bringing diseases native to Texas cattle, such as Texas Fever, spread by ticks. The Texas Longhorns were a much hardier breed than the northern cattle, and would rarely die from it, but as the herds passed through a region ticks would drop off, then infest local cattle, which would die. As a result, many local cattle ranchers would reject the herds passing through their neighborhoods.
[edit] Jobs
On a typical cattle drive, there would be 10 - 15 drovers (the cowhands), the trail boss, the chuckwagon cook, and also the wrangler (the head of the remuda). The drovers would herd the cattle along the trail, and would be positioned at many locations among the herd. Those who rode point, rode in the front, a little behind the trail boss. Then, the next set of experienced drovers would ride swing. After swing, was flank. And last, and least wanted, was drag. Many who rode drag were often new at driving cattle and rode in the dust.
The trail boss made most of the important decisions for the drive and was paid much more than the drovers.
The chuckwagon cook often travelled beside the herd, a little way off.
The wrangler looked after the horses. Most drives would include many horses so that the drovers could rotate horses and not wear them out, or injure any.
