I don't see, anywhere in the report that the Guardian story linked to, the term M&M, or chocolate, or candy. So why M&Ms as a word choice? The author is, apparently, a doofus.
From the link ( I assume we have the same result via the link?)
"A modified fish bait machine has helped create the vaccine, which will consist of M&Ms smeared in vaccine-laden peanut butter. Machett said lab tests show that prairie dogs find the bait “delicious”, with a dye added to the mix reliably showing up on the animals’ whiskers."
for me M&M will always mean chocolate....
eta, oh wait, you're saying the link from the Guardian article? Really? Not like the Guardian to get it wrong. Well spotted, that man.
ETA 2: Guess they are going with the biologist they quoted.
“We dropped the vaccine out of a bag while walking around, but that’s very hard to do over thousands of acres,” said Randy Machett, a FWS biologist. “Spraying burrows with insecticide to kill the fleas is also labor intensive and not a long-term solution. So we are working with private contractors to develop equipment to drop the vaccine uniformly across an area, rather than one hog getting to eat a big pile of them.”
Machett said a “glorified gumball machine” has been devised to dispense the vaccine. This device can be fitted to a drone, which will use its GPS to reliably drop vaccines at 30ft intervals. The drone will also be able to fire out the M&Ms to the left and right, meaning that three vaccines can be dropped at once.
A modified fish bait machine has helped create the vaccine, which will consist of M&Ms smeared in vaccine-laden peanut butter. Machett said lab tests show that prairie dogs find the bait “delicious”, with a dye added to the mix reliably showing up on the animals’ whiskers."
Randy does seem to exist
from
https://www.fws.gov/refuges/news/SpecialDelivery.html
"Where tagging is too costly or labor-intensive – as it is with prairie dogs – scientists find other ways to follow transplants. Staff at
Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge in Montana have relocated more than 2,600 prairie dogs. In 2007, they moved 800 to repopulate colonies after an outbreak of plague – a recurrent prairie dog threat. Leaving them where they were would have doomed the colony, says senior refuge wildlife biologist Randy Matchett. It also would have hurt other species that depend on prairie dogs, such as endangered black-footed ferrets. (When you’re a predator, you’re only as healthy as your prey.)"
