WEATHER: How did the woolly bear caterpillar became a weather forecaster?

We turned to the Farmer’s Almanac for the answer.

The folklore states if the caterpillar’s orange/rusty brown band is narrow, the winter will be snowy and conversely, a wide orange band means a mild winter. Also, fuzzier-than-normal woolly bear caterpillars are said to indicate that winter will be very cold.

Based off this theory — and this caterpillar found along West Corydon Street — the winter for McKean County should be moderately snow-covered and quite chilly.

According to the Farmer’s Almanac, although these caterpillars and their ability to predict winter weather have been part of American folklore since the Colonial era, the theory was actually popularized by entomologist Dr. Howard Curran, curator of insects at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.

In 1948, Curren was studying the caterpillars in Bear Mountain, N.Y., when he found that over half of his test subjects had wide orange bands. If the folklore was to be believed, the winter of 1948 should have been more mild than average. And it was.

Curren relayed his findings to a reporter for the New York Herald Tribune and an article was published.

Although he studied the caterpillar for eight more years, Curren was never fully able to conclude whether the caterpillar was a reliable prognosticator. So the truth behind the woolly bear’s reputation to predict the coming winter weather being fact or fiction is still a debatable topic.

While Curren was never able to determine myth from fact, the publicity surrounding his nine-year study made the woolly worm the most recognizable fall caterpillar in North America.