Groundhog Day live updates: Punxsutawney Phil predicts 6 more weeks of winter

In other parts of Pennsylvania, Punxsutawney Phil’s prediction was both confirmed and contradicted.

Grundsau Lodsch Nummer Sechzen am Yahden outside Allentown, or Groundhog Lodge No. 16 on the Jordan for those who don’t speak Pennsylvania Dutch, made a prediction of six more weeks of winter.

Octoraro Orphie, a stuffed groundhog in Quarryville, in the heart of Lancaster County’s Amish region, is said to have not seen his shadow and therefore predicted an early spring.

Mount Joy Minnie in Mount Joy also predicted warmer weather on the way. Also in Lancaster County, plush groundhog M.T. Parker said it’s going to be six more weeks of winter.

Poor Richard, a stuffed groundhog in York, not only is said to have predicted more winter, he also forecast the Seattle Seahawks will win the Super Bowl on Sunday.

More winter has a slight edge in the Groundhog Day predictions assembled at countdowntogroundhogday.com, a 15-13 lead over “early spring.”

Staten Island Chuck in New York joins Punxsutawney Phil in predicting six more weeks of ice and snow.

Others in the winter camp are Concord Casimir, a cat in Cleveland; Chuckles the groundhog and Scramble the Duck in Connecticut; and Holtsville Hal, a New York groundhog.

Warm weather forecasts have been lodged by Maple, a groundhog in California; and Cedar, a groundhog in Illinois.

Washington’s Potomac Phil predicts 6 more months of political gridlock.

The taxidermied animal was displayed in the capital’s Dupont Circle neighborhood where it was announced that the deceased marmot had seen his shadow, predicting both six more weeks of winter and six more months of political gridlock.

While Potomac Phil hasn’t been prognosticating nearly as long as his counterpart in Gobbler’s Knob, he has since predicted extended periods of political gridlock every year since his tenure began in 2012.

Michael Venos, who tracks Groundhog Day predictions at countdowntogroundhogday.com, said the early results Monday indicated a split verdict.

Agreeing with Punxsutawney Phil that more winter weather is on the way this year are General Beauregard Lee, a Georgia groundhog; and groundhog mascot Dover Doug in Pennsylvania.

Also in the “more winter” camp are That Dog Named Gidget, a Havanese in New York; and opossum Birmingham Jill in Alabama.

Those predicting an early spring include groundhogs Buckeye Chuck in Ohio; Fig Newton in North Carolina; and Shubenacadie Sam in Nova Scotia. They are joined by Benny the Bass, a fish in Ohio; and Pennsylvania ferret Jessup Giuseppe.

That’s just the start — Venos expects to tally about 100 events.

Melissa and Ryan Launder of Landers, California, were at the event as part of their 30th anniversary celebration this month.

“It’s cold but it’s fun,” Melissa Launder said.

Two friends from Pittsburgh made their first trip to see the event, both wearing blue ski hats with a groundhog face in the front.

“I’ve got my hand warmers, three pairs of pants, snow pants, four layers — but six more weeks of this,” said Alyssa Johnson, 24, giving a thumbs-down.

She held a sign that said “In Phil We Trust” on one side and “Team No Shadow” on the other.

“Booo!” yelled her friend, Anna O’ Connor, 23. But she said she’d come back again. “It was awesome.”

Usually guests can come up on stage and take pictures of Phil after his prediction.

But this time, the announcer said it was too cold for that and his handlers were afraid to keep him out too long.

The audience was asked to come up front, turn around and “do a selfie.”

After Phil saw his shadow, there was a mixed combination cheers and boos from the crowd.

Phil’s handlers on stage held signs saying, “Brrrr! More Snow,” and “Freezing Rain.”

Punxsutawney Phil’s forecast of six more weeks of winter was immediately followed by “The Pennsylvania Polka,” a dance hall standard in the Keystone State.

After that? The Sonny and Cher hit, “I Got You Babe.”

Punxsutawney Phil is predicting six more weeks of winter after his handlers said he saw his shadow outside his tree stump on Gobbler’s Knob.

The groundhog’s forecast was announced Monday by the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club in rural Pennsylvania.

If Phil hadn’t seen his shadow, that would have foretold an early arrival of spring.

Phil’s handlers have removed him from the tree stump on Gobbler’s Knob, minutes before he’ll make his annual forecast regarding the length of winter.

“Groundhaaaawwwg,” the official groundhog caller shouted out.

The audience responded, calling back.

Icy temperatures Monday kept the crowd bundled up — by all accounts the mercury remained in the low single-digits in the hours before the prognostication.

Dance music and probably a desire to stay warm kept people on the main stage dancing — including a cold looking beauty queen.

The Groundhog Day traditions include festive hats —and on Monday they were helping stave off the brutal cold.

The crowd and performers danced to tunes such as “Shout” And “Sunday Finest” in the cold weather.
It was 2 degrees out, according to the National Weather Service.

Phil was expected out soon.

A video said to have been produced by “the wizard of hog” got the crown ready for Phil’s imminent arrival.

Along with classic rock songs and the stadium anthem “Seven Nation Army,” it also included exhortations such as “All year we’ve trained for this” and “This means nothing and yet it means everything.”

The band “Juvenile Characteristics” sang “Wake up, Phil!”

They called out, “Let’s Wake Him Up!”

It is a Groundhog Day-themed song, often used to wake up Punxsutawney Phil at Gobbler’s Knob.

The group then led the crowd chanting, “Phil, Phil, Phil,” about 15 minutes before Phil was expected to come out.

Before the band “Juvenile Characteristics” took the stand, one member asked the crowd, “How many of you called in sick today?”

He added, “And you’re on national television, so smile to your bosses and teachers!” The crowd responded with cheers.

You have to be a resident of the Punxsutawney Area School District to become a member of the groundhog club’s inner circle — the tuxedo and top hat-wearing crew that runs the show.

They all have nicknames that befit their status — Shingle Shaker, Moonshine, Big Chill, Frostbite, Rainmaker, Iceman, Downpour, Fair Weatherman and Daybreaker, among them.

Openings come up infrequently, and the club looks for people who are willing to make the significant time commitment it takes to care for Phil and his family and put on the massive yearly event.

Country singer Ryan Jewel sang the national anthem to the crowd leading up to Phil’s debut.

Among the people saluting the flag on stage with him were Miss Pennsylvania, Victoria Vespico.

Fireworks followed with the main theme from “Star Wars” playing in the background.

As the crowd filled in, a large bonfire burned away from the main stage with people huddling around to stay warm in the frigid temperatures of Punxsutawney.

They wore fleece blankets with some wrapped in sleeping bags. A light snow was falling early, but had cleared as revelers awaited Phil’s prediction.

U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick was among the political figures drawn to the Gobbler’s Knob stage on Monday -- noting his mother was from Punxsutawney.

Also spotted were state Treasurer Stacy Garrity, who is currently pursuing the governorship, and top state Senate Republicans Joe Pittman and Kim Ward.

U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick from Pennsylvania, who said his mother is from Punxsutawney, appeared on stage to greet the crowd.

An hour before Phil made his debut, one group got up on stage and sang a medley of tributes to Phil to such tunes as “Pump Up the Jam” and “Gangnam Style.”

“Life’s too short, praise the groundhog,” they sang to the chorus of “Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy).”

AccuWeather’s chief long-range weather expert, meteorologist Paul Pastelok, said some clouds moved into Punxsutawney overnight, bringing flurries he called “microflakes.”

Pastelok said the coming week will remain cold, with below average temperatures in the eastern United States.

“We’ve still got some more snow and ice to contend with” in the mid-Atlantic, Ohio River Valley and Northeastern U.S., he said.

As for long-range forecasts, Pastelok said: “The farther out you get the accuracy is not specifically on point all the time, but we can get trends.”

Pastelok was in the State College area, about an hour from Punxsutawney.

A mother and daughter wearing groundhog costumes hoped that Phil wouldn’t see his shadow in a tune called “Gobbler’s Knob,” sung to Chappell Roan’s “Pink Pony Club.”

They sang, “Please don’t see your shadow, ‘cause we’re sick of the snow “ as they danced on stage.

The chorus went, “Gobbler’s Knob, we’re gonna keep on waiting on Gobbler’s Knob, we’re gonna keep on chanting for the groundhog, we’re gonna keep on dancing up on Gobbler’s Knob.”

Attendees are in their winter gear, some wrapped in fleecy blankets, some brought their sleeping bags with them to keep warm. Snow flurries fell earlier but have stopped now

Rick Siger, Pennsylvania’s secretary of community and economic development, was at the scene early Monday after meeting with the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club the previous evening.

The thermometer in Siger’s vehicle read 4 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 15 degrees Celsius) on his way to Gobbler’s Knob early Monday.

“I think it’s just fun -- folks having a good time,” said Siger, attending his fourth straight Groundhog Day in Punxsutawney. “It brings people together at a challenging time. It is a unifying force that showcases the best of Pennsylvania, the best of Punxsutawney, this area.”

The Department of Community and Economic Development supports the event with marketing and promotion, and over time has helped fund facilities upgrades. “It is quirky and I think that’s great,” Siger said.

Lisa Gibson was in Punxsutawney to attend Groundhog Day for the 10th time, wearing a lighted hat that resembled the tree stump from which Phil would emerge shortly after daybreak.

“Oh man, it just breaks up the doldrums of winter,” said Gibson, accompanied by her husband -- dressed up as Elvis Presley -- and teenage daughter. “It’s like Halloween and New Year’s Eve all wrapped up into one holiday.”

Gibson, a resident of Pittsburgh, was rooting for Phil to not see his shadow and therefore predict an early start to spring. She was there to “have a good time, and bring on that early spring.”

Celtic people across Europe marked the four days that are midway between the winter solstice, the spring equinox, the summer solstice and the fall equinox. What the Celts called Imbolc is also around when Christians celebrate Candlemas, timed to Joseph and Mary’s presentation of Jesus at the Temple in Jerusalem.

Ancient people would watch the sun, stars and animal behavior to guide farming practices and other decisions, and the practice of watching an animal’s emergence from winter hibernation to forecast weather has roots in a similar German tradition involving badgers or bears. Pennsylvania Germans apparently substituted the groundhog, endemic to the eastern and midwestern United States.

Historians have found a reference in an 1841 diary to groundhog weather forecasts in early February among families of German descent in Morgantown, Pennsylvania, according to the late Don Yoder, a University of Pennsylvania professor whose 2003 book about Groundhog Day explored the Celtic connection.

Yoder concluded the festival has roots in “ancient, undoubtedly prehistoric, weather lore.”

It all started in 1988 in Unadilla, a village of roughly 350 people. Groundhog Day parade organizer Bob Brandt spotted a dead groundhog in his cabbage patch and had him stuffed.

Unadilla Bill became a legend in town, but grew increasingly haggard-looking over the years. Parts of him were falling off. And it was no wonder; the job included leading the annual parade strapped to the hood of a car, regardless of the weather.

In 2021, a lady groundhog named Unadilla Billie took over. But groundhog enthusiasts can still see the original Unadilla Bill on display at a convenience store.

Feb. 2 might be known as Groundhog Day, but in Portland, Oregon, Stumptown Fil (short for Filbert) is the furry forecaster of choice.

Christina Parr, a keeper in the zoo’s North America section, says although they love groundhogs, they aren’t native to the Pacific Northwest.

Filbert made his forecasting debut in 2020. “He may not be a professional furcaster but he’s right about half the time,” she said.

Among the revelers streaming to the site early Monday was India Kirssin, there to celebrate her 27th birthday with a group drawn from Ohio and Washington, D.C.

Kirssin said it was her second Groundhog Day in Punxsutawney -- the first was on her 10th birthday.

“Everybody’s in a good mood, it seems like,” Kirssen said, holding a customized sign.

She floated the plan to return this year back in November: “It all came together last minute.”

Groundhogs are herbivores that are themselves edible to humans, although they are not widely consumed.

The Pennsylvania Game Commission says about 36,000 hunters reported killing more than 200,000 groundhogs last year.

Game Commission spokesperson Travis Lau found groundhog a bit stinky to clean and thick-skinned, but “actually really good” and “more like beef than venison.”

Some cooks advise that groundhogs are best taken when they are young and after clover is in bloom, since a clover diet is thought to improve the meat’s taste.

In New York City, Staten Island Chuck will make his prognostication about whether there will be an early spring on the 10th anniversary of a notorious incident that roiled the city.

It was on Groundhog Day 2014 that a predecessor of the Staten Island Zoo’s furry critter wriggled out of the hands of then-Mayor Bill de Blasio during the ceremony and fell to the ground. It died a week later.

An autopsy revealed it suffered internal injuries, but it was not clear if they stemmed from the fall.

And it wasn’t the first disastrous run-in between Chuck and a mayor. In 2009, Chuck bit through then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s glove, chomped on his left index finger and drew blood.

After the de Blasio debacle, zoo officials instituted new safety measures that remain in place today. Chuck is protected in a Plexiglas enclosure during the ritual, and no one is allowed to hold him except zoo handlers.

Groundhog lodges started opening in eastern Pennsylvania in the 1930s.

They were social clubs with similarities to Freemasonry, intended to preserve Pennsylvania German culture and traditions. Clubs would sometimes fine those who were caught speaking anything but their Pennsylvania Dutch language at meetings.

They were traditionally all-male groups and 15 such clubs remain active.

“I think it’s just one of these traditional rituals that people enjoy participating in, that maybe take them away from modern life for 15 minutes,” said William W. Donner, a Kutztown University anthropology professor and author of “Serious Nonsense,” a book about such lodges and other efforts to preserve German heritage.

Far from celebrating groundhogs, New Hampshire once tried to eradicate them from the state via a short-lived but wildly successful bounty on their pelts.

The state paid $12,206 in groundhog bounty claims for the fiscal year ending June 1885. At 10 cents per pelt, that amounted to more than 120,000 groundhogs — or woodchucks, as they were called then.

The bounty, which was repealed soon after, was the result of a legislative committee appointed to study the critters. Their view was decidedly negative.

Declaring the animals “not only a nuisance, but also a bore,” state Rep. Charles Corning called them “absolutely destitute of any interesting qualities” and “one of the worst enemies ever known to the farmer” in his 1883 “Report of the Woodchuck Committee.

The current groundhog population in New Hampshire is unknown, though they remain a frequent problem for gardeners, according to the University of New Hampshire Cooperative Extension.

Its experts don’t recommend killing them, however, noting that their burrows provide shelter for other animals. Instead, officials recommend fencing as a way to keep them from devouring veggies.

A couple hundred people are expected to gather Monday afternoon in Bee Cave, located just west of Austin, to watch an armadillo named Bee Cave Bob.

Mike Burke, who helped start the annual tradition, believes an armadillo “knows a whole lot more about what’s going on than some rodent.”

Their ceremony also includes watching to see if the animal sees his shadow, but they aren’t opposed to improvising a little to make sure the crowd goes home happy.“A lot of the times when it’s been kind of a crummy winter, we’ll predict early spring no matter what,” he said.

Some well-meaning efforts have sought to determine Phil’s accuracy, but what “six weeks of winter” means is debatable. By all accounts, the furry prognosticator predicts more winter far more often than he predicts an early spring.

And claims that a groundhog has or has not seen its shadow — and that it’s able to communicate that to a human — are also fair territory for skeptics and the humor-impaired.

Among the skeptics is the National Centers for Environmental Information, within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The government agency last year compared Phil’s record with U.S. national temperatures over the prior decade and concluded he was right only 40% of the time.

Ancient people would watch the sun, stars and animal behavior to guide farming practices and other decisions, and the practice of watching an animal’s emergence from winter hibernation to forecast weather has roots in a similar German tradition involving badgers or bears.

Pennsylvania Germans apparently substituted the groundhog, endemic to the eastern and midwestern United States.

Historians have found a reference in an 1841 diary to groundhog weather forecasts in early February among families of German descent in Morgantown, Pennsylvania.

The groundhog is a member of the squirrel family and related to chipmunks and prairie dogs. It’s also known as a woodchuck, a whistle pig — or in the parlance of Pennsylvania Dutch, a language with German roots, a “grundsau.”

Their lifespan in the wild is typically two or three years, and they’re mostly solitary creatures who start to emerge in midwinter to find a mate.

The science behind whether they can make any accurate weather predictions is problematic at best.

It’s part of a tradition rooted in European agricultural life, marking the midpoint between the shortest day of the year on the winter solstice and the spring equinox.

What the Celts called Imbolc is also around when Christians celebrate Candlemas, timed to Joseph and Mary’s presentation of Jesus at the Temple in Jerusalem.

Punxsutawney is an area that Pennsylvania Germans settled — and in the late 1880s started celebrating the holiday by picnicking, hunting and eating groundhogs.

Members of Punxsutawney Groundhog Club, organized in 1899, care for Phil at a customized space beside Punxsutawney Memorial Library — where there’s a window with a view into the creature’s burrow.