Travelers of Dodge County, WI were surprised when their snow covered highway ran red with a sea of Skittles on Tuesday night. The Dodge County Sheriff’s Office had to send in quite the clean up crew for the literally thousands of red Skittles that covered the highway.
After an investigation it was discovered that the Skittles were taking a ride on the back of a flatbed truck when the cardboard box holding them gave way to the damp air. This caused the box to tear and dump all of the skittles onto Dodge County Highway.
The story could be left there, or you can find out WHY thousands of red Skittles were traveling in a box down the highway. It’s apparently common practice to feed rejected candy to livestock. These red candies were all turned down by Skittles and were purchased by a livestock farmer to feed his cattle as a more cost efficient source of carbs.
While humans cannot live well off of candy cast-offs, Ki Fanning, livestock nutrition expert with Great Plains Livestock Consulting says, “(It) is a very good way for producers to reduce feed cost, and to provide less expensive food for consumers.” Feeding livestock in this fashion isn’t a new trend but did pick up speed when the price of corn shot up in 2012.
University of Tennessee animal science professor, John Waller, says it’s actually a fine diet for cattle. “The alternative would be to put it in a landfill somewhere,” he said. Many people are shocked from this discovery, tweeting things like:
“Skittles fell off a truck that was hauling the red candies to be used as cattle feed.” Taste the rainbull? https://t.co/5ZTirccfNm
— Michael Nedelman (@MikeNedelman) January 19, 2017
@KTLA it’s the end days. “And there was a sea of red…”
— Lily (@LilyDelBarrio) January 19, 2017
@CNET @Skittles how has this not been a @skittles commercial yet?!?
— Josh Herman (@JJherman2016) January 19, 2017
Candy isn’t the entirety of their diet. While thousands of Skittles were spilled across the highway, candy only makes up about 3% of their overall diet, and if we are being honest, that’s probably less than what you consume. It’s also a tasty way to fatten up beef cattle without causing harm to the cattle or human consuming cattle beef/milk. Overall, it’s something safe that has been happening with your hamburgers for decades now.
My only question is how can I buy a cheap box of rejected candy?
