The Wooly Worm

"We're gonna have a hard winter." That was the old expression that one heard for many years when the old timers observed the little wooly bear or worm every fall.

Some of the early settlers had great faith in this little worm. Where this old adage originated is not known but we do know it had existed for many generations.

Every fall, hundreds of these little worms can be seen crawling on the highways, in fields and around our homes. There seems to be several theories about it. One is that if it has more black than reddish brown, the winter will be severe. If they are all black, be prepared for the worst. The more brown-the milder will be the weather. The second theory is-if the end bands are wider than the first part of the winter will be mild. If the end bands are narrow and more reddish brown appears, we will have many blizzards.

Over the years I picked up hundreds of these little worms. I have found many varieties. They were not all the same. Some had wide black bands, others had narrow bands and a few were all black.

Years ago several scientists made a number of observations on the wooly bear. They were unable to come to any conclusion that the color bands had any relation to future weather conditions.

Many have asked the age-old question, What is a wooly bear? It is the larva or worm of the beautiful tiger moth that we see in the summer. It had beautiful striped wings and black dotted body.

In their life cycle, the moth lays hundreds of eggs on leaves of the broad leaf plantain. Most lawns have this weed. When the eggs hatch, the small worms feed upon the leaf. The worms mature in the summer. What we see in the fall is the mature worm continually crawling until it finds a place where it can curl into a round ball in or under logs, leaves and stone piles to spend the winter months. In the spring it comes out of its winter home, crawls on to logs, small trees and bushes where it begins to spin a silk sack around itself. In this sack the worm in about a week, transforms itself into a winged insect to begin its cycle all over again.

Many adults and children have gathered the wooly worms and placed them in glass jars containing dried twigs and leaves. In the spring they watch them spinning into a cocoon and later become a beautiful moth.