Photo by Steve Wrzeszczynski on Unsplash
Pennsylvanians love their pets, but every Feb. 2, even pet parents of mice, hamsters, and gerbils turn their attention to an entirely different rodent: the groundhog. Early that morning, groundhog handlers across the state take the furry prognosticators from their dens and check to see whether he (or she) has seen their shadows. If they do, another six weeks of winter is predicted, but if not, an early spring is said to be on the way.
But how did this annual tradition begin, and why are we taking weather predictions from rodents?
A weather-predicting rodent?
Groundhog Day got its start long before there even was a Pennsylvania, though back then, the forecasting was done by hedgehogs. According to VisitPA, the people of ancient Germany noted that animals such as hedgehogs were good at predicting changes in the weather, and legend had it that clear skies (conducive to seeing shadows) on Candlemas, celebrated Feb. 2, meant winter weather would continue, while cloudy skies predicted an early spring.
When German settlers came to Pennsylvania in the 1700s and 1800s, they brought their custom along; but with no hedgehogs to be found, they simply substituted groundhogs.
The first official Groundhog Day was celebrated in 1887 in Jefferson County when the members of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club spread the word about the annual event and then made their yearly hike to Gobbler’s Knob to see what the groundhog known as Punxsutawney Phil predicted.
That’s how Phil became the OG Groundhog Day mascot. There are others, but in Pennsylvania at least, most of them are stuffed toys or taxidermied groundhogs. Elliott and Lily, located at Acorn Acres Wildlife Rehabilitation in Lancaster, are real-life groundhogs. But they make their predictions based not on shadows or the lack thereof, but on a choice between two bowls of food.
How often is Phil right?
Incidentally, Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow this year, but don’t let it get you down. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which “graded the groundhogs” from around the U.S. on their accuracy over the past 20 years, Phil is only correct about 35% of the time.
