Without a resident woodchuck, Milwaukee County Zoo is calling on a surprise guest animal for its 2026 Groundhog Day prediction.

Hope’s popular Groundhog Day celebration, presented by Main Street of Hope and Utopia Wildlife Rehabilitators, is just around the corner, where Hope will declare if we’ll have an early spring or six more weeks of winter.

Learn about the origins of Groundhog Day, how to watch Punxsutawney Phil’s prediction, and why the groundhog is accompanied by men wearing tuxedos and top hats.

Since the 1800s, Groundhog Day has been observed on Feb. 2. The longstanding tradition calls for groundhogs to tell us if spring is near.

It shares its name with a classic film in which a single day is stuck on repeat — but Groundhog Day is a day like no other. That's especially true for a small town in Pennsylvania, where celebrity groundhog Punxsutawney Phil delivers his annual weather ...

Whether you call him groundhog, woodchuck, whistle-pig or use the full genus and species name, Marmota monax, the nation’s premiere animal weather forecaster has been making headlines as Punxsutawney Phil for decades.