Punxsutawney Phil has nothing on the Drowned Hogs when it comes to the lengths taken to prognosticate the weather. While Phil lounges on a velvet-lined tree stump and a fleet of top-hatted handlers gently coax him into making his wintry prediction, members of the Drowned Hogs submit themselves to a plunge in the Atlantic Ocean to find out what February in Massachusetts really feels like. (Hint: Wicked cold.)

This Saturday, February 2nd marked the 13th annual Drowned Hogs event held on Nantasket Beach in Hull, Massachusetts. Several hundred people showed up on that sunny Saturday to participate in the annual event, either as Drowned Hogs or Dri-Hogs (the very necessary towel holders). But jumping into the icy Atlantic waters isn't enough to accurately predict the coming of spring: one must do it in style. The Drowned Hogs are full of characters; those lined up to take the plunge included: Chewbacca in a Pats jersey, a giant banana, the Hulk, a caveman, a burger-head, a gorilla, a Hawaiian bear, an Orlando Magic player, and a cardboard robot.

Post and photo contributed by Bailey Triggs. She has more photos of the event up on Flickr, and you can read more of her work at Diverted Motion. More on the Drowned Hogs after the jump!

Watching this motley crew of brave souls make the long jog out to the mid-tide waters, the question on every Dri-Hogs' mind was whether spring was on the way. As the Drowned Hogs' rhyme goes: "If the Drowned Hogs frolic in the icy brine,/Spring will arrive right on time./But if they dunk, scream, and run right out,/There will be a six-week bout." Word had already passed through the crowd that Phil had predicted another six weeks of winter, but what would our Hogs have to say about that?

Nate Taylor, brave caveman and Hingham native, was the first to rebuff Phil's prediction of a long winter. "I definitely witnessed some cavorting and play fighting out there in the water; when you see slap and tickle you know it's an early spring." Fellow Hingham native and 2nd-time Hogs participant, Paul Villanova, agreed with Taylor's assessment and questioned Phil's predictive power: "Just think about it from a quantitative level: you have one dumb beast versus a hundred intelligent people. Who do you think is going to better predict the weather?"

Whether or not jumping into the Atlantic Ocean in the middle of February qualifies you as an "intelligent" person, participants in this annual event are definitely generous: all Drowned Hogs are encouraged to obtain sponsors and raise money, with the proceeds going to the Wellspring Multi-Service Center in Hull, a charity's that's aim is "to reach beyond providing emergency services to help people to become more independent and productive members of the community."

Having successfully completed it's 13th year, could it ever be possible for the Drowned Hogs' popularity to surpass that of Punxsutawney Phil? Villanova thinks so, "If we could get Bill Murray in on a movie about the Drowned Hogs, we could overtake Phil."