A crop circle, crop formation, or corn circle is a design made by flattening plants, usually a grain like wheat or barley. The term was first used in the early 1980s. Some people, including Taner Edis, a physics professor at Truman State University, have said that all crop circles fall within the range of things that humans could create as tricks or hoaxes.
Although some people suggest that natural causes or aliens might be responsible for crop circles, there is no scientific proof to support these ideas. All crop circles are believed to be made by humans. In 1991, two men named Doug Bower and Dave Chorley claimed they created over 200 crop circles in England during interviews. After these interviews, reports of crop circles increased greatly. In the United Kingdom, crop circles are not found randomly. Instead, they often appear near roads, areas with medium to large populations, and cultural landmarks, such as Stonehenge or Avebury. Most crop circles are discovered overnight. In 2003, nearly half of all crop circles found in the UK were within a 15 km (9.3 mi) area around the Avebury stone circles.
Unlike crop circles, archaeological remains can sometimes create cropmarks in fields that look like circles or squares. These cropmarks do not appear suddenly and are always in the same places each year.
History
A 1678 news pamphlet titled The Mowing-Devil: or, Strange News Out of Hartfordshire described a crop whose stalks were cut instead of bent. (See the folklore section for more details.)
In 1686, an English naturalist named Robert Plot wrote about rings or arcs of mushrooms in The Natural History of Stafford-Shire, suggesting that air flows from the sky might cause them. In 1991, meteorologist Terence Meaden connected this report to modern crop circles, a claim similar to those made by Erich von Däniken.
An 1880 letter to the editor of Nature by amateur scientist John Rand Capron described several circles of flattened crops in a field. He said the circles formed under suspicious conditions and possibly due to "cyclonic wind action." He noted that from a distance, the circles looked similar, with a few standing stalks in the center, some prostrate stalks arranged evenly in a circle around the center, and a circular wall of stalks outside that had not been damaged.
In 1932, archaeologist E. C. Curwen observed four dark rings in a field at Stoughton Down near Chichester. He could only examine one, which had barley that was "lodged" or beaten down, while the inside area was slightly mounded up.
In Fortean Times, David Wood reported that in 1940, he made crop circles near Gloucestershire using ropes.
In 1963, Patrick Moore described a crater in a potato field in Wiltshire that he believed was caused by an unknown meteoric body. Nearby wheat fields had circular and elliptical areas where the wheat was flattened, with evidence of "spiral flattening." He thought the flattening might be caused by air currents from the impact, as the patterns pointed toward the crater. Astronomer Hugh Ernest Butler observed similar craters and suggested they were likely caused by lightning strikes.
During the 1960s, many reports of UFO sightings and circular formations in swamp reeds and sugarcane fields were made in Tully, Queensland, Australia, and in Canada. For example, on August 8, 1967, three circles were found in a field in Duhamel, Alberta, Canada. Investigators from the Department of National Defence concluded the circles were artificial but could not determine who made them or how. The most famous case was the 1966 Tully "saucer nest," when a farmer said he saw a saucer-shaped craft rise 9 or 12 meters (30 or 40 feet) from a swamp and fly away. After investigating, he found a nearly circular area 10 meters (32 feet) long by 8 meters (25 feet) wide where the grass was flattened in clockwise curves to water level, and the reeds had been uprooted from the mud. Local police, the Royal Australian Air Force, and the University of Queensland believed the formation was likely caused by natural forces, such as a down draught, a willy-willy (dust devil), or a waterspout. In 1973, G.J. Odgers, Director of Public Relations for the Department of Defence (Air Office), wrote to a journalist that the "saucer" was probably debris lifted by a willy-willy.
After the 1960s, many UFOlogists appeared in Wiltshire, and rumors of "saucer nests" spread in the area, though they were never photographed. Other reports of circular formations before 1970, especially in Australia and Canada, were simple circles that could have been caused by whirlwinds.
British pranksters Doug Bower and Dave Chorley reported in 1978 that they began creating crop circles in British cornfields, inspired by the Tully "saucer nest" case.
The first film to show a geometric crop circle, created by super-intelligent ants, was the 1974 science-fiction film Phase IV. This film has been cited as a possible inspiration for the pranksters who started the crop circle phenomenon.
Most reports of crop circles appeared and spread after the late 1970s, as many circles began appearing across the English countryside. Around this time, researcher Colin Andrews began documenting the phenomenon. In 1989, he co-authored Circular Evidence with Pat Delgado, a book that compiled reports and photographs of early formations. The phenomenon became widely known in the late 1980s after the media started reporting crop circles in Hampshire and Wiltshire. After Bower and Chorley gave interviews in 1991 about creating crop circles, similar formations began appearing worldwide. By 2001, about 10,000 crop circles had been reported internationally, including locations in the former Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, Japan, the U.S., and Canada. Researchers noted a connection between crop circles, recent media coverage, and the absence of fencing or anti-trespassing laws.
Although farmers worried about crop damage, local responses to crop circles were often enthusiastic, as communities took advantage of increased tourism and visits from scientists, researchers, and people seeking spiritual experiences. This interest led to bus or helicopter tours of circle sites, walking tours, T-shirts, and book sales.
Since the start of the 21st century, crop formations have grown larger and more complex, with some featuring up to 2,000 different shapes and incorporating mathematical and scientific details.
Researcher Jeremy Northcote found that in 2002, crop circles in the UK were not randomly spread across the landscape. They tended to appear near roads, areas with medium-to-dense populations, and cultural heritage monuments like Stonehenge or Avebury. He noted that they always appeared in easily accessible areas, suggesting they were more likely made by humans than by paranormal activity. Another indication of this theory was that people living in areas with the most crop circles had a history of creating large-scale formations, such as stone circles like Stonehenge, earthen mounds like Silbury Hill, long barrows like West Kennet Long Barrow, and white horses carved into chalk hills.
Bower and Chorley
In 1991, two men, Doug Bower and Dave Chorley, claimed they began the crop circle phenomenon in 1978. They used simple tools, such as a wooden plank, rope, and a baseball cap with a wire loop to help them walk in straight lines. To prove their claim, they created a crop circle in front of reporters. A cereologist, or someone who believes crop circles have supernatural causes, named Pat Delgado, examined the circle and said it was genuine before it was revealed to be a trick.
Bower and Chorley said they were inspired by reports of crop circles in Australia from 1966. They claimed to have created all crop circles made before 1987 and more than 200 circles between 1978 and 1991, while other circles were made by different people. In an article for Physics World, Richard Taylor from the University of Oregon wrote that the designs Bower and Chorley made encouraged others to create crop circles. Instead of disappearing, crop circles have grown into a global phenomenon, with hundreds of complex designs appearing each year worldwide.
Art and business
In the 1970s, simple circle shapes were first reported. Over time, more complicated geometric patterns were created by unknown artists, sometimes to draw visitors to certain areas.
Since the early 1990s, a UK group called Circlemakers, started by Rod Dickinson and John Lundberg, and later joined by Wil Russell and Rob Irving, has made crop circles in the UK and globally as part of their art and for businesses that pay for their work.
The Led Zeppelin Boxed Set, released on September 7, 1990, along with remastered versions of the first and second boxed sets, includes a picture of a crop circle that appeared in East Field, Alton Barnes, Wiltshire.
On the night of July 11–12, 1992, a competition to create crop circles with a prize of £3,000 (partly funded by the Arthur Koestler Foundation) took place in Berkshire. The winning team, three engineers from Westland Helicopters, used rope, PVC pipe, a plank, string, a telescoping tool, and two ladders to make their design. Rupert Sheldrake stated the event was organized by him and John Michell and co-sponsored by The Guardian and The Cerealogist. The prize money came from PM, a German magazine. Sheldrake noted that the competition proved humans could create all features of advanced crop circles at the time, with 11 of the 12 teams producing designs that matched the competition’s requirements.
In 2002, Discovery Channel asked five students studying space and flight from MIT to make crop circles to copy features claimed to distinguish real crop circles from fake ones, such as those made by Bower and Chorley. The process was filmed for the Discovery Channel documentary Crop Circles: Mysteries in the Fields.
In 2009, The Guardian reported that crop circle activity in Wiltshire had decreased, partly because creators preferred making designs for companies that paid them well.
A video shown during the opening of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London displayed two crop circles shaped like the Olympic rings. Another crop circle resembling the Olympic rings was visible to passengers arriving at Heathrow Airport before and during the Games.
In December 2017, a 3-hectare (7-acre) crop circle depicting the Star Wars Rebel Alliance emblem was created in California by a father and his 11-year-old son as a spaceport for X-wing fighters.
Legal implications
In 1992, Gábor Takács and Róbert Dallos, both 17 years old, became the first people to face legal action after creating a crop circle. The two students, who attended the St. Stephen Agricultural Technicum, a high school in Hungary focused on agriculture, made a crop circle with a diameter of 36 meters (118 feet) in a wheat field near Székesfehérvár, a town 69 kilometers (43 miles) southwest of Budapest. This happened on June 8, 1992. In September, the two appeared on Hungarian television and showed that the crop circle was a hoax by displaying photos of the field before and after the circle was made. Because of this, Aranykalász Co., the landowners, sued the teenagers for 630,000 Hungarian forints (about $3,000 USD) in damages. The judge decided the students were only responsible for the damage caused by the circle itself, which was about 6,000 Hungarian forints (about $30 USD). The judge also said that 99% of the crop damage was caused by the many visitors who came to Székesfehérvár after the media promoted the circle. The TV show eventually paid the fine and the students' legal costs.
In 2000, Matthew Williams became the first person in the UK to be arrested for causing criminal damage after creating a crop circle near Devizes. In November 2000, he was fined £100 plus £40 in costs. As of 2008, no other person in the UK had been successfully charged with criminal damage for making a crop circle.
Creation
Most scientists believe that crop circles are made by people for jokes, advertising, or art. The most common way to create a crop circle is by tying one end of a rope to a fixed point and the other end to a board that crushes the plants. If it has recently rained, grass can be bent without breaking, a method used to make a crop circle in Hungary in 1992. People who study unexplained phenomena say that all features of crop circles match what hoaxers could make.
In 1991, Bower and Chorley admitted to creating the first crop circles in southern England. When some people did not believe them, they added straight lines and squares to prove the circles were made by humans. Later, more complex designs appeared worldwide, including fractal shapes. Scientists suggest that advanced designs might use GPS and lasers. In 2009, a circle was created over three nights and left unfinished.
Critics of the idea that non-human forces make crop circles say that no evidence besides eyewitness accounts supports this claim. Many crop circles are known to be made by humans, and others can be explained as such. Some researchers claimed crop circles were real until the people who made them were discovered, such as Bower and Chorley or others who tricked investigators. In his 1995 book, Carl Sagan said crop circles were made by Bower and Chorley and their followers. He also said some people ignore proof of human involvement to believe in alien origins.
Some crop circles are created for advertising. Many designs include symbols like hearts or alien faces. In 2004, people caught making crop circles in the Netherlands. Some people suggest that crop circles might be caused by unusual weather, like tornadoes or lightning, but there is no proof of this.
In 1880, a scientist named John Rand Capron wrote that circles in crops were caused by storms. In 1980, a meteorologist named Terence Meaden proposed that whirlwinds made the circles. As designs became more complex, Meaden suggested unusual theories, like "plasma vortexes." In 1991, physicist Stephen Hawking said crop circles were either hoaxes or made by wind. After Bower and Chorley admitted to creating the circles, Meaden agreed that complex designs were made by humans.
In 2009, a government official in Tasmania said wallabies might have made crop circles after eating opium poppies. In the 1980s and 1990s, some magazines suggested that microwave radiation bent plants, but this is now considered false science.
Since the 1980s, crop circles have been studied by people who believe in unexplained phenomena, including ideas that they are messages from aliens or linked to ley lines. Some think ball lightning or supernatural forces make the circles, but scientists say there is no proof.
A few scientists, like Eltjo Haselhoff and William Levengood, claimed that plants inside crop circles showed differences that suggest they were not made by humans. Levengood published studies in 1994 and 1999. However, Joe Nickell, a researcher, said Levengood’s work had flaws and that his claims were not reliable. Nickell also said Levengood’s reasoning was circular, meaning it assumed what it was trying to prove.
The Indonesian National Institute of Aeronautics and Space said crop circles are man-made. Scientists and skeptics say there is no credible evidence that aliens or other non-human forces created crop circles.
Related art
Patterns similar to crop circles can also be created in snow using skis, snowshoes, or even regular shoes. People can make images in forests by cutting down trees, especially in areas with snow. During the Olympic Games in Lillehammer, Norway in 1994, a 360-meter (390-yard) tall designed image of an Olympic torch runner was made in a forest near one of the event venues.
Folklore
Researchers who study crop circles have connected them to old stories and legends to suggest that these patterns are not made by people. Crop circles depend on the culture of the area: they are most often found in developed, non-religious Western countries where people believe in New Age ideas, such as Japan. They are not seen in other regions, like Muslim countries.
Fungi can cause circular areas of crops to die, which may have inspired old tales about "fairie rings." These stories also often mention glowing balls of light, but they are never connected to crop circles.
A 17th-century English woodcut called the Mowing-Devil shows the devil with a scythe cutting a circular pattern in a field of oats. A pamphlet that includes the image explains that a farmer was upset with the high wage his worker asked for and said he would rather have "the devil himself" do the work. Crop circle researcher Jim Schnabel does not believe this image is an early example of crop circles because the plants were cut, not bent. The circular shape led the farmer to believe the devil had caused it.
In the 1948 German story Die zwölf Schwäne (The Twelve Swans), a farmer finds a circular ring of flattened grain in his field each morning. After several attempts, his son sees twelve princesses disguised as swans. They remove their disguises and dance in the field. Crop rings caused by fungi may have inspired such stories, as folklore often says these rings are made by dancing fairies or wolves.