Hola,
How much could a woodchuck chuck, if a woodchuck could chuck wood?
Question, is there an animal called a woodchuck in the world? Is he like a beaver?
SENOR
Woodchucks are a variety of North American marmot, also called groundhogs. They are not noted for any wood chewing or chucking.
The original phrase was “how much upchuck would a woodchuck upchuck if a woodchuck would upchuck wood?” The answer is 5 to 7 cc’s of mostly spruce twigs.
700 pounds, give or take.
Yep. It’s a small, furry rodent with short legs, heavy body and a tendency to annoy farmers by digging burrows through their crops.
I’m hearing the faint echoes of nazi’s here…
The woodchuck would chuck as much wood as a woodchuck could chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood.
Keep it up people, and someone is going to have to ZOT you.
You owe the Oracle a birch.
This is the Straight Dope website, and we do have the advantage of almost all of Cecil’s prior columns, readily available to a quick search.
You go the Home Page and then to the section called ARCHIVE and you do a quick search on “woodchuck” and lo!: How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?, the Perfect Master speaketh, bow and tremble all ye who fear your shadows.
Short legs, yes. Heavy body, yes. Small? Well, if you consider a 15-20 lb. rodent that stands 18" tall “small,” then I guess so… My 8.5 lb. mini-Dachshund would probably not agree.
Groundhogs do annoy farmers, and the annoyances do have to do with “digging burrows” and “crops,” but not quite in the way you describe. Groundhogs dig fairly large burrows, generally with two entrances – a “main” entrance used for daily comings and goings and a “back door,” in case the main entrance is invaded.
But it is rare to see a burrow actually in a crop field. (I’m excepting hay; I speak more of soybeans and such.) Rather, the burrow is usually found on the periphery of the crop field, often in or along a fencerow or hedgerow. In the case of a soybean field, early in the growing season it’s quite easy to locate a groundhog burrow from a distance – just scan the edges of the field and find a nearly-bare area shaped like a ‘D.’ You can bet the 'hog’s burrow is at the edge of the field at the center of the D’s radius.
The burrows themselves are hated by farmers mainly because they’re holes in the ground. Cattle and horses can and do inadvertently step in the holes and break legs. And groundhogs are not shy about burrowing under a structure, such as a barn or shed or corn crib, which sometimes causes the structure to be undermined to the point of collapse.
But farmers are annoyed by groundhogs mainly because they’re some of nature’s premier eating machines. From the end of the mating season in spring until well into the fall, groundhogs have no other assigned activities – they just eat and sleep. I used to know several farmers who not only welcomed me and my rifle to their property, but actually paid me $5 for every groundhog tail I brought to the house on my way home.
It ain’t just farmers who have problems with woodchucks/groundhogs. If you live near a golf course (prime woodchuck territory, it would seem), you quickly discover that they like to burrow under things like porches and patios. Since their burrows are quite large, they tend to undermine these structures. They’re not particularly aggressive, but they are very stubborn about returning to their favorite burrowing places. In my neighborhood, we have a Have-A-Heart trap that gets passed around regularly, depending upon who’s doing battle with the varmints.
BTW, 15-20 pounds is a rather large, fat woodchuck. They CAN get that big, but I would have guessed 10 pounds as more typical. This reference gives their weight as 4 1/2 to 14 lbs:
The ones inhabiting areas around farmer’s fields and eating the crops are typically pretty well fed, much to the annoyance of the farmer, as already noted. They LOVE oats fields.
You can eat them - I had woodchuck a few times as a kid. I don’t particularly care for it - the meat is very dark, and resembles a rather lousy grade of beef.
Well, I suppose it would make a nice change from my usual rat fillets. :eek:
Even worse, a cal. .22 hollow point right in the middle of body mass at 50 yards only seems to increase a big, mature groundhog’s natural shyness for a few days and does not degrade its enthusiasm for new lettuce at all.
Argh! I canna take it anymore.