{"id":14774,"date":"2026-01-29T14:52:18","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T22:52:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/?p=14774"},"modified":"2026-01-29T14:54:37","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T22:54:37","slug":"groundhog-daythe-what-and-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/groundhog-daythe-what-and-why\/","title":{"rendered":"Groundhog Day\u2026the what and why?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Early or Late Spring?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thousands of years ago when animalism and nature worship were prevalent, people in the part of Europe where Germany is today, believed that the badger had the power to predict the coming of spring. They watched the badger to know when to plant their crops.
\nThis tradition was brought over to North America, predominantly to Pennsylvania in the United\u00a0States, where it was the groundhog, not the badger, which made these \u201cpredictions\u201d.
\nAccording to folklore, if the groundhog sees its shadow on February 2 it will return to its burrow, indicating that there will be six more weeks of winter. If it does not see its shadow, then spring is on the way.
\nThe Groundhog Day concept first became popular in Canada in 1956 when Wiarton Willie became a household name for his early February weather predictions. Wiarton\u2019s Groundhog Day festival grew as Willie\u2019s fame increased. It became one of the largest winter festivals in Bruce County, Canada.
\nThere are also other groundhogs in different parts of Canada. For example, Shubenacadie Sam is reportedly the first groundhog in the country to stick its head out on Groundhog Day. Other groundhogs include: Gary the Groundhog in Ontario, Brandon Bob in Manitoba and Balzac Billy in Alberta.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/span>Kennedy, Ava and I will be watching what Van Island Violet does on Vancouver Island and we’re all hoping she sees her shadow and winter stays! We are hoping for some snow this year!<\/p>\n

Our class voted overwhelmingly, 18 to 4, that she would see her shadow and winter would stay. Can’t wait to see!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Early or Late Spring? Thousands of years ago when animalism and nature worship were prevalent, people in the part of Europe where Germany is today, believed that the badger had the power to predict the coming of spring. They watched … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":513,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14774"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/513"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14774"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14774\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14777,"href":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14774\/revisions\/14777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sd41blogs.ca\/watts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}