JACKSON, Georgia — With Groundhog Day on Feb. 2, we wanted to know what ever happened to Georgia's most-famous weather-predicting rodent.
General Beauregard Lee lived at the Yellow River Game Ranch in Gwinnett County for more than 25 years until the ranch suddenly shut down in 2017.
But that didn't stop the weather-predicting tradition.
He was moved to Dauset Trails Nature Center in Jackson, Georgia, to carry his duty of predicting an early spring -- or declaring a longer winter.
Dauset Trails Director, Ike English told 11Alive sister station WMAZ last year that Waffle House hash browns and Indian Springs water is what has kept the south's "Doctor of Southern Groundology" predicting the weather for 39 years.
"He's got a 94% rating, I think. I think he's been right that often. He's made a couple of slip ups with some blizzards, but we won't go into that," English said during the 2020 event.
Pennsylvania's Punxatawney Phil only has a 39% accuracy rate, English joked.
Unfortunately, 2021 will come without the crowds, according to the Dauset Trails website. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, they said this year's event won't be open to the public.
But that isn't going to stop Gen. Beauregard Lee from predicting the weather. They said they will post on their website if he saw his shadow or not.
According to our 11Alive StormTrackers, the forecast for Tuesday is mostly sunny. So what does that mean? According to the legend, the groundhog returns to his burrow and we will endure six more weeks of winter.
11Alive will update you as soon as we find out if he saw his shadow! Meanwhile, in Pennsylvania, a livestream, which had more than 15,000 viewers at one point, played footage from previous Groundhog Day's ahead of the big reveal. You can see what happened here.
