Putting a dollar in a claw machine and losing (or once-in-a-while winning) a stuffed animal is a time-honored tradition for kids. But when a 12-year-old girl went to look at which prize she wanted to win and bring home, she got a bit more than she bargained for. One of the ‘prizes’ blinked at her.

Serenity Myers was waiting inside Meadows Frozen Custard. The shop had arcade games, as well as a mini-golf course behind it. The young girl was waiting with her grandparents to go play, when she4 noticed the claw machines.

In among the neon-bright toys, a darker one was sitting. But this was not an ordinary stuffed animal – it was a real, live groundhog. “I was looking at all the prizes,” Serenity said, “And I found a groundhog in the claw machine.”

A groundhog gazes at its reflection while stuck in a claw machine. Photo by Joel Meadows

Familiar with the chubby rodents since one lived near her home and another had made its way into the family’s home ventilation system, she immediately knew what she had discovered. “I told Pap, and then I told Grandma, and then I told the lady who was at the counter,” Serenity said. “She didn’t look like she believed me,” she said.

However, inside was a quite content, and comfortable, groundhog that had found itself a cozy spot to rest. The shop’s co-owner said that at first, they did not know what to do. But Joel Meadows called the state police, which in turn contacted the local game commission.

“I was thinking maybe it got its head stuck in a soda machine,” Pennsylvania State Game Warden Salvadore Zaffuto said. But when he arrived, he realized this was not a simple case of pulling an animal’s head out of a machine.

I could see fur here and there, and it just would pop its head up,” he said.

The small, muddy footprints up the prize delivery chute gave the little woodchuck away. “It was just there having a good old time, and swimming with the stuffed animals,” Zaffuto said. The animal was not hurt, he said, and likely only trapped for just a few hours.

Photo by Joel Meadows

After the machine’s door had been opened by the game company, Zaffuto used bite-proof gloves to pull out the creature and load it into a crate. The animal was then released onto a state-owned piece of land a bit aways from the custard shop.

The shop leaned in on the bit of notoriety from the incident and made the groundhog its mascot. They added groundhog plushies and “Respect the Groundhog” t-shirts to the shop’s offerings. All long with a new, groundhog-free machine.

Sources: The Guardian | Washington Post