Fern Glen Essays
A Woolly Bear Winter
by Judy Sullivan

Life in semi-rural upstate New York daily intersects with various flora and fauna, though much of it goes on at an almost unconscious level. Literally stopping to smell the roses, or sniff the skunk cabbage, seems more difficult to schedule in our frenetically paced 21^st century society. Certainly events in the entomological world escape our notice until the little buggers make their presence known, usually in some negative fashion. For example, some species of wasps and bees, attempting to nest under eaves and soffits, resent human comings and goings from houses and sheds and pursue us with extreme prejudice. Armies of ants, seemingly unprovoked, will overrun kitchens and bathrooms for a few days, then retreat as quickly as they came. Find an imbedded black-legged tick in the warm folds of your middle aged spread, followed by a 28 day course of powerful antibiotics, and you'll not soon forget that the insect world is tiny, but prodigious.

Perhaps Star Trek's first officer Spock put it best when he said "In all the galaxy, humans are indeed very curious creatures." Who among us, for instance, while plodding down the sidewalk, hasn't veered to deliberately squash a dirty tent worm or brazenly colored gypsy moth caterpillar? More curious still, who won't admit to indiscriminately applying a firm foot to any grubby, ugly caterpillar-like thing that crosses our path, never to consider that later in life it could well have become a beloved monarch butterfly or ethereally beautiful luna moth. Yet, I challenge anyone to show me a moderately sensitive man, woman or child who hasn't paused in mid-stride to avoid stepping on the woolly bear caterpillar, clad in its rugby shirt pattern of black and rust.

I not only avoid stepping on this creeping crawler, but stop, bend down to pick it up, and wait for it to curl into its defensive hedgehog posture before placing it gently in the grass away from the clumsy feet of passersby. Wiping its defecation on the leg of my jeans, I feel better about it and myself. It takes so little to enhance one's self esteem. In fact, in October, when woolly bears determinedly trundle across the tarmac by the thousands, I'll risk collision to avoid spilling their guts. They're just sooo cute! Unlike mosquitoes and ticks, they pose no threat. No Lyme disease, Erlichiosis, or West Nile virus - they're adorable. Perfect color coordination and appealing fuzziness, each an emissary from the insect kingdom that comes in peace. Maybe nature isn't out to get us after all. Some even believe the woolly bear can help us predict the weather.

Historically, it's hard to say for how long Americans in northern climes have been looking at the band width of the woolly bear caterpillar as a predictor of winter weather. Specifically, as this popular lore would have us believe, the wider the reddish-brown band, on this predominantly black caterpillar, is in autumn, the milder a winter the region will experience. Conversely, it's thought that a very narrow brown band indicates a severe winter season.

However, in 1948 one Dr. C. H. Curran, a curator of insects at the Museum of Natural History in New York City, took his wife for a leaf peeping tour of Bear Mountain, a pleasant (at least at the time) hour's drive north. As is often the case with scientists, Dr. Curran experienced difficulty disengaging himself from his work. He began an informal study of the correlation between the red to black color ratio of the woolly bear caterpillar and subsequent winter weather. Each year for eight years, Curran collected as many woolly bears as he could in an autumn day, determined the average number of russet segments among each caterpillar's total of 13, and issued a prognostication to a reporter at the New York Herald Tribune. Surprisingly, this somewhat tongue-in-cheek study demonstrated approximately 70% accuracy in predicting overall winter conditions. Although under no illusion that his limited sample pool could constitute scientific proof, his work was sufficient to allow him to justify his vacations at "Woolly" Bear Mountain. In fact, the Currans and their friends organized The Original Society of the Friends of the Woolly Bear.

To this day, most scientists place little stock in the woolly bear as mini-meteorologist, although all will agree that the larger number of reddened segments can, indeed, tell us something about winter weather conditions. Last year's, that is.

In spring, the woolly bears wake to spin cocoons. The newly emerged Pyrrharctia moths lay eggs, which hatch into new little woolly bears. They eat, grow, and shed their skin. Each successive molt produces an additional red segment, and the indicative band grows wider. Therefore, the earlier that warm weather commences in spring, the more time the caterpillars have to develop a wider cummerbund of red, and this tells us that last year's winter was milder than normal, although many of us are of the opinion that all winters represent severe weather. So, it would appear that although the woolly bear is a great short-term weather archivist, it's not much of a forecaster. Or is it?

If we think again of autumn color band width and its relationship to the time a woolly bear has to grow, we would surmise that a caterpillar with a narrow red belt had a late start in life due to the last winter's weather. But, what if it had an early finish? If summer were summarily dismissed weeks in advance of its usual departure and frost adorned the pumpkin while still green, the woolly bear would be curling up for a long winter's nap without an extra molt or two.

It's a simple matter of locating local meteorological data to determine if early cold and wet autumns are usually followed by cold, wet winters. If such is the case, the somber sartorial dignity of the earnest little woolly bear is as reliable a forecaster as that delivered by any media weathercaster. Some might say, more so. I invite you to share your own conclusions.

Questions, comments, or other feedback to Judy Sullivan.