Ms. G Predicts 6 More Weeks of Winter

Ms. G, the official groundhog of Massachusetts, predicted six more weeks of winter after seeing her shadow this morning at Mass Audubon’s Drumlin Farm Wildlife Sanctuary in Lincoln. If she had not seen her shadow, it would’ve meant an early spring.

This is the second year in a row Ms. G saw her shadow. The 50 people who braved the 16-degree weather were slightly disappointed, but not surprised, when the Commonwealth’s most famous prognosticating marmot stepped out into the bright sunshine. Now in her nineteenth year of weather predictions, Ms. G has erred on the side of more winter slightly more often (10 times) than she has foreseen an early spring (nine times). She also agreed with her slightly more famous Pennsylvanian woodchuck colleague, Punxsutawney Phil, who also called for more wintry weather.

Although the two groundhogs have agreed for three years in a row now, Ms. G is far more accurate compared to Punxsutawney Phil with 60 percent of her predictions being on target as opposed to Phil’s 30 percent.

The popular annual event at Drumlin Farm attracts scores of children and families eager to catch a glimpse of their favorite groundhog. The story of Ms. G began with a group of first-graders at the Hunnewell School in Wellesley, who worked with Mass Audubon and local elected officials to write a bill that eventually became law in 2014, designating Ms. G as the state’s official groundhog.

“As the Commonwealth’s most prominent wildlife ambassador, Ms. G serves as a symbol of the animals and their habitat that we all can help to protect by working together in our communities,” said Mass Audubon Chief of Staff Renata Pomponi. “Celebrating Groundhog Day at Drumlin Farm is a fun way to mark the change of seasons but also highlights the importance of fighting the impacts of climate change and the loss of biodiversity, so that we and wildlife like Ms. G can continue to prosper in our New England winters.”

Mass Audubon’s Senior Naturalist Tia Pinney welcomed attendees to the Groundhog Day celebration, which also featured family-friendly groundhog crafts, opportunities to observe other resident wildlife, and the chance to explore the 291-acre sanctuary’s trail network.

Pinney explained the origins of Groundhog Day, how New England wildlife survives the winter, how the changing climate is impacting their habitats, and discussed how Ms. G is one of several non-releasable animals at Drumlin with issues that prevent her from living successfully in the wild. Attendees also learned that groundhogs are the third-largest member of the rodent family, can tunnel up to five feet in a single day, and are true hibernators whose body temperatures drop from 90 degrees to 40 degrees while their heartbeats go from 100 beats per minute to as few as four.

Like most of us, Ms. G did not want to come out of her home and took almost five minutes to be coaxed out into the freezing temperatures. But eventually she began to explore her surroundings to the delight of children and other onlookers and eventually saw her shadow in the bright sunshine.

When asked if Ms. G had any Super Bowl predictions, Pinney said the official state groundhog of Massachusetts is, of course, rooting for the New England Patriots on Sunday to defeat the Seahawks. However, her powers of prognostication are restricted solely to weather.