From The Hammock

Keep an Eye on the Sky … and Other Weather Indicators

By ROBIN LOCKWOOD

I have always been fascinated by the way Nature shows us how the weather will be. Years ago, my beloved grandmother told me about the Wooly Worm Lady of East Tennessee. She had two basic premises of winter weather prediction: counting the number of fogs in August, and the color of the wooly worms. Those who are my friends on Facebook followed my counting of the fogs in August, 2010.  I counted 13 fogs: we had 10 snows. Hey, aren’t we all grateful?

Wooly worms are the larvae of the Isabella tiger moth, (Pyrrhactia isabella).  The larger the band of black on a wooly worm, the colder the winter. A solid black woolly worm means it will be a really bad winter, while a brown one means it will be a mild winter. If they are crawling south it will be a bad winter and north is good.

Another winter prediction tool is the cutting of persimmon seeds. Once cut open, look into the middle and see if you find a spoon, knife or fork shape. The knife symbolizes a very cold icy winter, a spoon means heavy snow: you have to dig yourself out, and a fork indicates a mild winter.

“Red skies in the morning, sailors take warning and red skies at night, sailor’s delight.” I’ve never seen this one miss.

“Tails pointing west, weather’s at its best. Tails pointing east, weather is least.” This one refers to the direction cattle and horses stand; they prefer to turn their hind ends to bad weather.

"When the leaves on the trees turn upside down, a storm is brewing.”

These are only a few of Nature’s weather indicators. Check them out for yourself and let me know what you discover.

 Robin Lockwood lives in the southwest section of Williamson County and is a founding member of the Leiper’s Fork Garden Club. She is well known as an herbalist and for her column “Robin’s Remedies.”