Happy Hedgehog Day!
Yes, dear friends, the original "Groundhog Day" was in fact "Hedgehog Day". The Romans observed that hedgehogs had remarkable predictive powers for the length of winter around the February time period. Now, of course, hedgehogs are nocturnal creatures, so they looked for their shadow in the full moon rather than the morning light, but the idea is the same.
When settlers from Europe came to the New World, they brought brought their traditions, but not their hedgehogs, so they had to find a local equivalent - the ground hog (completely unrelated, but undeniably just as cute). Of course "Groundhog Day" sounds better on a calendar (or your local chamber of commerce) than say, "Woodchuck day", "Lowland Grizzly Day", or (my personal favorite) "Whistle Pig Day".
For the interested, here is a link for the origin of Hedgehog Day:
http://hedgehogcentral.com/hedgehogday.shtml
When settlers from Europe came to the New World, they brought brought their traditions, but not their hedgehogs, so they had to find a local equivalent - the ground hog (completely unrelated, but undeniably just as cute). Of course "Groundhog Day" sounds better on a calendar (or your local chamber of commerce) than say, "Woodchuck day", "Lowland Grizzly Day", or (my personal favorite) "Whistle Pig Day".
For the interested, here is a link for the origin of Hedgehog Day:
http://hedgehogcentral.com/hedgehogday.shtml