The Winnipeg Willow was six. The Groundhog Day ceremony was canceled
A marmot in Canadian wildlife center rehabilitation died on Saturday, just days before the ceremony in which the animal "provided" when will the coming of spring. The Groundhog Day celebration of the rehabilitation center was canceled after the unexpected death of Winnipeg Willow, who was six.
"We are completely shocked," wrote the officials Prairie Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre in Winnipeg, Canada. "Just this morning it was normal to eat a carrot, but when we came tonight we met her dead."
On 2 February, several cities in Canada and the US north Celebrate Groundhog Day with a ceremony in which a groundhog comes out of the woodwork. If the animal come to own shadow (ie if it is a sunny day), there will be six more weeks of winter. If the groundhog does not see the shadow, then spring will come early.
This year will be a longer winter in Winnipeg, where the ceremony whose star was Winnipeg Willow was canceled. Willow was born in January 2010 and was brought to the rehabilitation center still baby after her mother was killed by a dog. Unable to return it to nature for having used too dependent on the center's employees.
"We loved predict the spring, and I think only we hit once," reads the publication of the Prairie Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre blog. "From her behavior this winter, we would predict that spring would come early because she had been wanting to go abroad." Marmot was six years old, and the average life expectancy of this type of animal is between four and six years.
The Groundhog Day was made famous in popular culture through the Groundhog Day movie (1993), starring Bill Murray, in which the character played by Murray was forced to repeat the same day every day - and that day was Groundhog Day , Philadelphia