Giving Me the Woollies

For years, I refused to draft a bucket list. A few months ago, however, my perception was forever changed while attending a conference where speakers discussed local festival development in Western North Carolina. Even as a lifelong resident, I was struck by the sheer number of festivals held in our region. 

Just as I started to think that maybe, just maybe, this could be the making of my bucket list, hallelujah—it happened. The fine folks from Banner Elk showcased their signature event, the 38th Annual Woolly Worm Festival. Who could resist? My decision was made. I would be there. No doubt this was a once-in-a-lifetime—OK, once every year—experience. And it was certainly the beginning of one fine bucket list.

I assessed my knowledge of the creepy crawlies. Woolly worms lay claim to being the quintessential predictors of Appalachian winter weather. Sorry, Punxsutawney Phil—woollies are prevalent, accessible, and arguably just as cute. However, as one of my elementary school teachers, Ms. Roos, recently reminded me, dozens of woolly worms used to pursue her exterior classroom door like heat-seeking missiles, which in turn, would be weaponized by the boys in our grade to torture the girls. Ironic, seeing as most of us young ladies would shake off the shrieks, go home, and collect woollies ourselves, designing only the finest habitats out of shoeboxes for their palatial domiciles. 

I also grew up hearing, like most, that an all-black caterpillar (indeed, they aren’t really worms) foretold ominously of a particularly harsh winter. The wider the width of the tan band wrapping the woolly, the bigger the glimmer of hope for milder weather. That, or the poor thing just has unfortunate tan lines. 

Yet, those are merely the basics of woolly wisdom. If I was to vie for Woolly Worm Festival Queen (which doesn’t yet exist, but should), I needed to up my game. Anyone can drive a few miles, purchase a ticket, eat enormous quantities of fried food, and call it a day. I needed to research, to prepare myself for the inaugural event on my bucket list. I needed to do my woolly worm homework.

If we are to truly appreciate all the woolly has to offer, it is important to understand that the woolly worm that many of us have come to know and love is, in actuality, the larval form of Pyrrharctia isabella, the Isabella tiger moth. The Isabella takes flight as a pale, yellowish-orange moth that many of us have likely seen a million times without recognizing its cuddly past.

Like the countless other folklore methods for predicting weather, the use of woolly worms has likely been around for centuries. However, the method’s popularity dates to the 1948 Bear Mountain State Park experiment conducted by Dr. C. H. Curran, curator of insects at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. After his study of collected woollies, Curran reported that the caterpillars were able to predict winter weather conditions with nearly 80 percent accuracy. He brought along his wife and friends to help collect the species each fall, declaring themselves as The Original Society of the Friends of the Woolly Bear. Which brings us to another key acknowledgement: Woolly worms are also known throughout the country as woolly bears and, my personal favorite, woolly boogers.

While Curran’s experiment may have provided circumstantial evidence at best (his sample sizes were notably small), our fine fuzzy friends do offer their own proof of climate awareness and negotiation. Their woolliness is a result of tiny bristles that trigger the freezing of water as cooler temperatures arrive. This allows their outer cells to thaw and freeze first, thereby protecting their internal cells during a cryogenic winter slumber. In a 2013 article by Bruce Haden, entomologist Mike    Peters adds that the brown band is an indication of how late in the spring the caterpillar was able to begin producing its hair, an acknowledgment of the harshness of the previous winter.

But in 1973, Woolly Worm Festival founder Jim Morton was more concerned with how one might select the best weather-predicting worm. Because, the fact remains, we are just as likely to spot an all-black worm two feet from a brown and black worm on the same day as we are to see consistency across woollies. Morton solved this dilemma with a worm race. The winning worm’s coat offers the official prediction. Perhaps we should try this with our local network forecaster. It could make the six o’clock news more interesting.

Ultimately, just as it is impossible to predict when I should begin my bucket list and how long it should be, it is also impossible to know what Old Man Winter has in store for us and which woolly worms will show up in our yards. Will they be back in black, or will orange be the new black? 

All we can do is amuse ourselves with festivals, family excursions, and warm fuzzies while we await Mother Nature’s next surprise.

About the author: Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle is an award-winning author and member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians.