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Celebrate Groundhog Day 2008 with Holland Huck

At a few minutes before 8:00 a.m. (sunrise is around 7:46 a.m.), Huck is carried outside to make his weather prediction.

If you arrive early, you're invited inside the home of Huck's owners, Terri and Charlie, for conversation, tasty treats, and a hot beverage.

From an invitation card I received:

We are having two contests this year.

1) Make a groundhog themed treat for this year's celebration (cookie, muffin, cake, etc.) and your creativity could be rewarded with a special prize.

2) Take the best picture of Hucky alone (not Charlie and Terri) you can. If we choose your picture to use for next year's Holland Huckleberry Day card, you will win a special prize!


Holland Huck photos


Past Holland Huck Groundhog Day postings :

created by jr on Jan 31, 2008 at 12:12:24 am
updated by jr on Jan 31, 2008 at 12:36:09 am     Comments: 9

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tags: event   GroundhogDay   HollandHuck   

Comments ... #

I know i say it everytime this comes up, but that little guy is so freaking adorable!

posted by tm2 on Feb 01, 2008 at 08:22:31 am     #



Where IS my 00 6?

posted by holland on Feb 01, 2008 at 12:36:31 pm     #



Don't worry. Holland Huck's owner is a farmer, and he still shoots groundhogs. Charlie found Huck when Huck was a baby. I think a coyote took out one of Huck's parents. More about Huck:

We got him in May 2000 when he was about 3 weeks old and about 5 inches long. For the next 6 weeks we fed him soy-based baby formula out of an eyedropper every 4 hours. We slowly worked hamster/gerbil food into his diet along with dried apples, dried apricots and acorn nuts. His favorite food is peanut butter on toast for breakfast with the rest of the family. He also enjoys red clover blossoms, lambs quarters, salted peanuts in the shell, potato chips and sweetened iced tea. He has litter trained himself by taking over the cat's litter box on our screened in porch.

In the summer we keep him in a 2-story condo made out of 2 large dog cages one on top of the other in our porch. He likes to ride around in the front basket of our Polaris ATV. He makes a total of 4 different sounds. To those of us that handle him frequently he is friendly and gentle. He is only a 6-month pet because around the 1st of September he starts going into hibernation mode. Everyday he starts sleeping more and more until he slowly fades away into total hibernation around the first of November.

Around the 1st of April he wakes up looking for a mate. During his hibernation he sleeps in a nest of towels in a smaller cage in our basement where it is cool and quiet.

posted by jr on Feb 01, 2008 at 01:10:42 pm     #



Oh man, I hate it when they're cute. Last year I folded in my rabbit extermination efforts when I accidentally stumbled on a nest of youngun's. There I was with four little soon to be lettuce chompers and what do I do? Carefully recover the nest. Think I'll get the family out to meet Huck.

posted by holland on Feb 01, 2008 at 02:06:49 pm     #



Sans weaponry.

posted by holland on Feb 01, 2008 at 02:59:14 pm     #



Groundhog Predicts More Winter
Saturday, 2-Feb-2008 8:50AM EST Story from AP
Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press (via ClariNet)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Associated Press/AP Online
PUNXSUTAWNEY, Pa. - Brace yourself for more wintry weather.

Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow Saturday, leading the

groundhog to forecast six more weeks of winter.

The rodent was pulled from his stump by members of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club Inner Circle, top-hat- and tuxedo-wearing businessmen who carry out the tradition.

Each Feb. 2, thousands of people descend on Punxsutawney, a town of about 6,100 people some 65 miles northeast of Pittsburgh, to celebrate what had essentially been a German superstition.

The tradition is that if a hibernating animal sees 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.

That was the forecast from Gen. Beauregard Lee, Punxsutawney Phil's counterpart in Lilburn, Ga. Beau did not see his shadow Saturday morning at the Yellow River Game Ranch.

It was the third year in a row the two groundhogs' predictions differed.

posted by Darkseid on Feb 02, 2008 at 09:21:07 am     #



Around 100 people watched Holland Huck make his forecast this morning. Huck did not see his shadow, so we won't get six more weeks of winter around these here parts. Spring officially begins on March 1st no matter what. The meteorological calender starts the seasons on the first day of the month.

This morning's Holland Huck action :

posted by jr on Feb 02, 2008 at 10:44:31 am     #



I'm embarrassed that I'm asking ... Does the family wake him up or is Holland Huck's biological clock so finely tuned that he gets up the same date every year?

He is a cutie! Looks like my husband when he is sleeping.

posted by corky on Feb 03, 2008 at 11:21:46 am     #



Huck is woken up for the event. Two or three days before Feb 2, I think the owners move Huck's cage from the basement to the living room to begin the temporary wake-up process. Except for the period around Groundhog's Day, Huck is in full hibernation mode from early November until about April, like all groundhogs in this part of the country. That's why it has never made sense that a Pennsylvania groundhog would be out and about in February, unless a bomb blast forced it out of its hole. A Fox Squirrel or some other critter that is normally running around in the northland in the winter should have been the forecaster.

posted by jr on Feb 03, 2008 at 03:30:50 pm     #