A major dispute has broken out in the world of animal weather forecasters. While the groundhog Punxsutawney Phil insists that there will be six more weeks of winter, Westchester’s own Cluxatawney Henrietta Chicken at Alfred B. DelBello Muscoot Farm predicts an early spring. Henrietta’s forecast coincides with the early spring forecast from Chuck The Staten Island Groundhog.
The record books show that the groundhog Punxsutawney Phil has about a 40% success rate in making the right prediction about how much winter remains following Groundhog Day. The Punxsutawney Groundhog Club was formed in the 1880”™s and since 1887 there has been a gathering on Gobbler’s Nob on Feb. 2 carrying on what originally was a German tradition that if a hedgehog saw his shadow winter would continue.
Deputy County Executive Ken Jenkins was among those on hand at Muscoot Farm in Katonah to find out whether Henrietta had laid an egg on Feb. 2, which would be her way of predicting an early spring.
“Staten Island has Chuck, and Pennsylvania has Punxsutawney Phil, but we have Cluxatawney Henrietta,” Jenkins said. “She puts us on the map in Westchester in our own unique way in commemorating Groundhog Day.”
Jonathon Benjamin, farm manager at Muscoot Farm, said that Henrietta is about 3-1/2 years old and an Americana breed of chicken.
“She has a beard and she also has ear muffs,” Benjamin said, explaining that chickens are the closest living relatives to dinosaurs. “Some dinosaurs, we’re learning, even had feathers.”
Muscoot Farm was originally owned by the Hopkins family and used as their summer estate and dairy farm from 1880 to 1924. In 1924 the family moved to the farm year-round and continued the dairy business until 1967 when Westchester County acquired the property. In 2016 Muscoot was re-named in memory of Alfred B. DelBello, who served as Westchester County Executive from 1974 to 1983, and who played an integral role in preserving the park as an interactive farm during his tenure.
