FAYETTEVILLE, NC — A herd of dependents were found in the Fayetteville Harris Teeter early Sunday morning, having escaped from the confines of Fort Bragg.

“It’s a combination of two things,” said Cumberland County Sheriff Earl R. Butler. “Their normal food source is closed and the post isn’t repairing the fence line like they should. Both are on account of ongoing problems stemming from the government shutdown.”

The Sheriff’s Department is trained to respond to dependents who wander into urban areas, but nobody can remember an incident of this scale.

“The environment changes and they don’t know what to do. All they know is there’s no food where there used to be, so they go out searching for more,” said Dr. Evan Farren, a veterinarian specializing in dependents. “They tend to have large litters of children and get a little spooked when processed food is scarce, even if their regular habits are altered for just a few hours.”

Security footage caught the first dependent crashing through an ex…