Bison

North American Road Builders (Scientific Theory)
Mastodons were browsers, not grazers. They tended to go in a straight line from food source to food source. These massive animals in massive herds would continually walk the same paths for thousands of years. This would make a wide compacted flat trail. Rain water would carve the trails deep into elevated regions, contributing to the developing of mountain passes. When the mammoths (grazers) migrated (mostly north-south) they tended to follow the mastodon tracks where they found them because it was easier than navigating vegetation and unflattened paths. Also the enormous prehistoric muskox traversed these trails. This occurred twice a year for thousands of years, further developing the path. So great was the traffic that even the narrowest paths and the rockiest ground were eventually reduces to wide smooth surfaces. The Mastadons and and mammoths were both replaced by the bison (that were much, much larger at one time) that engaged in browsing (a little bit), grazing, and migrating on these very old paths. The Native Americans followed the bison on these paths and used these paths for travel in general. Eventually the settlers where guided to these paths by the Native Americans or occasionally the modern bison. These paths, when located, were an excellent start for railroads and eventually paved roads. This one reason is why rails roads and bison did not coexist well. the paths were made even wider and flatter and in some cases carving into mountains to make them shorter. These were inviting to the bison and even shelter in mountain passes where the carved path was ,ore out of the weather . Sometime they would block the tracks for days. Sadly, there is not one road, or even an American car, named after mastodons, mammoths, muskox, or bison.

This article is duplicated in the mastodon group
This article is duplicated in the mammoth group