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GroundHAWWWG!!

© Barbara Hall

It all started because we just don't have any hedgehogs. If nothing else, in this good ole US of A, we're adaptable.

So when the German settlers were frantically hunting for hedgehogs to tell them when Spring would arrive, the Indians held up their own pudgy marmot and said "Will this do?"...a Legend is Born.

And so every February-the-two, also known to others as Candlemas, or mid-winter's Day, we wait reverently to see if Punxsutawney Phil will see his shadow or not. I have ALWAYS assumed this is just a good excuse for a party and exchanging GroundHog Day gifts, as I have NEVER seen Spring start on Feb 3rd....EVER. So I've pretty much held to the idea that if Phil sees his shadow, Spring will arrive in 6 weeks and if he doesn't, it'll be here in a month and a half. And I'd go off and make soup anyway - and put up the GroundHog Day lights.

So here you are, all these years, thinking that GroundHogs are just pudgy rodents intent on destroying your garden. Actually, they're rather complex creatures and have earned their Meteorological Marmot status. Deep in the ground, below frost level, our 'marmota monax' is snoozing away having greatly decreased its body temperature, heart rate and respiration. Deep in its 'hibernaculum' this blob of fur STILL reacts to the lengthening daylight hours and its GroundHog Hormones are what wake it up. Besides, after fattening itself up on all your garden plants, it has lost nearly half its body weight from when it snoozed out in October. Hungry Hog Indeed.

And don't think for a minute there is no better use for a GroundHog than furry weatherman.....look at the Cornell Research on hepatitisB and liver disease that comes to us through Woodchuck Research.

But on to the festivities in the GroundHog capital of the universe, Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. It all started in 1887 with a GroundHog Hunt and Picnic, during which one Clymer H. Freas pronounced those revellers to be the Punxsutawney GroundHog Club. After a few more beers, he was able to remember the Pennsylvania Dutch legend about the GroundHog and the weather and figured...why not? So he claimed all weather rights for the Punxsutawney GroundHog. His home (the groundhog, not Clymer Freas....) has been Gobbler's Knob ever since and here you'll find a splendidly entertaining history of said GroundHog Club and the growing media event that has become Punxsutawney Phil's Weather Prognostications!