[lawgirl]

(NO this is not a thread about X42 so don't go there! LOL!)

[Paradox]

I think you have discovered a remnant of Osama Bin Ladens beard. He got blowed up, and the fragment must have landed in your house..

Just in case, feed it some bacon :)

[mtngrl@vrwc]

EEEeeek! **passing out**

All right, I am ok now. Living in California, I have absolutely no idea what a long winter is! LOL

Anyway, I guess I am not the right person to ask about this. :(

[Texaggie79]

Do you like cheese?

[BigBlueJon]

Grandma back in Kentucky would say get ready for a cold one. Good catch.

[kristinn]

A thick stripe like that means a winter of apocalyptic proportions. I'm stocking up on six month's worth of food, water and Cipro right away. Thanks !!!

[Pokey78]

I thought this was a wooly worm:

[Fred Mertz]

Here in Kentucky they even have a Wooly 'Worm' celebration/festival. I don't know how to read them though.

[DallasMike]

This winter will be colder than last summer. I guarantee it.

[nagdt]

I was golfing this week and saw a few wooly worms on some of the putting greens. Here in Dallas they were a lovely color..hummmm...like burnt orange. I had to "do away" with the critters as they were in my line. What does it all mean?

[SarahW]

The width of the brown bands on the banded woolly worm is used as a winter indicator. Wider brown bands are said to indicate milder winters. This means that the more black the woolly worm has the more harsh the winter will be. All black woolly worms indicate severe winters.

I don't know about any grammas in Kentucky, but mine in East Tennessee would predict a mild winter, if she were to observe the abnormally wide brown band on the referenced wooly bear.

[Keith in Iowa]

About Woollybears...

[Protect the Bill of Rights]

I think a thicker, wider stripe means a colder, longer winter with more snowfall.

[Gordian Blade]

The "wooly worm" or "wooly bear" has 13 bands representing the 13 weeks of winter. The darker the band, the colder and snowier that week. (Which is strange to me, because where I live, when it gets really cold, it doesn't snow.)

Here's the link.

[lovemycody]

Brace yourself lawgirl,get those long-johns out,and stay tuned for ol'man winter, cause he's a'coming!

[Saundra Duffy]

You didn't squash it did you? For victory & freedom!!!

[teletech]

North Carolina Weather Lore

back to Fall Color

North Carolina Traditional Weather Lore

Back in the early days, when plants and animals were first made, they were told to fast and stay awake for seven days to gain spirit power. All were anxious to gain power so they tried to do as instructed and most were able to stay awake through the first night. The next night some started to fall asleep, and by the third night many of them were asleep. By the seventh night, only a few of the animals were awake. The panther, the owl and one or two others managed to stay awake and as their reward they were given the power to see and go about in the dark. Many of the plants also fell asleep and of the trees, only the cedar, the spruce, the pine, the holly, and the laurel were able to stay awake. As their reward, these were allowed to be always green, while the others must lose their leaves in the fall.

James Mooney, in his important work, 
History, Myths, and Sacred Formulas of the Cherokee, 
relates the Cherokee's explanation for fall.

---

These are some of the more popular North Carolina folk sayings about autumn and the weather. Many variations exist and have been reported in numerous sources, including the Old Farmer's Almanac, the Foxfire series, and the collections of the NC Folklore Society. All of them are guaranteed to be true (sometimes).

• A warm November is the sign of a bad winter.

• Thunder in the fall foretells a cold winter.

• If animals have an especially thick coat of fur, it will be a cold winter.

• When squirrels bury their nuts early, it will be a hard winter

• If the woolly worms head is more black than colored, the coldest part of the winter will come in the first months of winter.

• The more black than brown a wooly worm has, and/or the wider the black stripe, the worse the winter.

• If fruit trees bloom in the fall, the weather will be severe the following winter.

• If berries or nuts are plentiful, it will be a hard winter.

• A cold winter is succeeded by a warm winter and vice versa.

• If the first snow falls on unfrozen ground, expect a mild winter.

• It will be a bad winter if trees keep their leaves until late in the fall

• Hornets nest built in the tops of trees point to a mild winter.

• The first twelve days of the year are thought to foretell the weather for each of the next twelve months. The variant is the 12 days from new Christmas (Dec. 25) to old Christmas (Jan. 5) determine the weather.

• If an owl hoots on the east side of a mountain it denotes bad weather.

---

© 1999 NCNatural
Last updated
For information about advertising or webservices, email "birdsong@ncnatural.com"

[Bump in the night]

That's a "wool bear moth caterpiller". We have LOTS of those here! I'm a cranberry grower in Oregon, and I constantly pick them out of the bogs when we harvest. Some say that middle stipe on their back (how big or little it is) will determine if you're going to have a cold or warm winter. LOL. But I don't know which determines which. Cute, aren't they!

[tubebender]

I can't beleive the luck. I am looking for someone versed in folk lore myself. I have lived in this house for 22 years and while we have always had a mole or two make a mound or two this year we have at least 5 and the theory of how the Rocky Mountains were formed is being challanged here on the North Coast of Upstate Calif. Each of these critters is forming at least two large mounds a day. Any ideas?

[error99]

A careful analysis of your wooly worm reveals that
it will get cold this winter
and then warm up in the spring.
Hope this helps...

[DaughterofEve]

Just make sure there's not 100 more of them eating your wool clothes somewhere in the house.

Here's my personal favorite insect, the rosy maple moth: