Punxsutawney Phil's Winter Predictions Not Popular

[knocker]

PUNXSUTAWNEY - Pennsylvania's Punxsutawney Phil told people to prepare for six more weeks of winter on Thursday, making him the minority opinion among his groundhog brethren who seem to think that spring is coming early.

But with such a mild and relatively snowless winter so far, who can tell the difference?

Phil's "prediction" came as he emerged from his lair to "see" his shadow on Gobbler's Knob, a tiny hill in the town for which he's named about 65 miles northeast of Pittsburgh.

Yet groundhogs in at least five other states -- West Virginia's French Creek Freddie, Georgia's Gen. Beauregard Lee, Michigan's Woody the Woodchuck, Ohio's Buckeye Chuck and New York's Staten Island Chuck (full name: Charles G. Hogg) -- did not see their shadows. Nor did Ontario's Wiarton Willie or Nova Scotia's Shubenacadie Sam.

The Groundhog Day celebration is rooted in a German superstition that says if a hibernating animal casts a shadow on Feb. 2, the Christian holiday of Candlemas, winter will last another six weeks. If no shadow is seen, legend says, spring will come early.

Temperatures were near freezing when Phil emerged at dawn - unseasonably warm for Punxsutawney - and were forecast to climb into the mid-40s in a winter that's brought little snow and only a few notably cold days to much of the East.

http://www.ydr.com/ci_19879502?source=most_viewed

The question is do we have any reliable rodent forecasters?

[Pixel]

No..

but the birds had nicked all the berries off our Pyrancanthas the week before last...

Hardly a six week indication yet it's the only hint I got apart from these (-:

all for the same day - 5th Feb 0z gfs

Maybe Chio in the strat thread is our hamster?

Edited February 3, 2012 by Pixel Precipitation