Initial Field Report
of the Howell Township, Livingston County, Michigan Crop Circle Formation
[Ground photo
of Howell Township crop circle formation facing West.]
Introduction
On July 29-31,
2003, a private scientific research team documented physical evidence
revealing that the Howell Township, Livingston County, Michigan
crop circle formation was not made by hoaxers.
The team
consisted of Jeffrey Wilson,
Todd Lemire, and Dr.
Charles Lietzau of Michigan, and Roger
Sugden of Indiana. Arriving at the field on July 29, 2002,
we discovered and photographed the presence of several anomalies
that cannot be duplicated by hoaxers.
Account
of Discovery
Mike Esper,
the farmer, on the afternoon of July 24, was harvesting his field
at the corner of Mason and Burkhardt roads when he noticed a small,
approximately 10’ diameter circle of flattened wheat near
the Western edge of his wheat field. He didn’t think very
much of it, other than considering it might have been made by
some kids, and drove his combine right over the top of it. Soon
after, about 100 feet to the East, Mr. Esper spotted a much larger,
flattened circle of wheat, and steered his harvester around the
circle leaving approximately 10-15 feet of standing wheat bordering
the flattened wheat. Mr. Esper was insistent that there were no
tracks into either of the circles, and there was no other flattened
wheat in the field. Mr. Esper had contracted a third party to
spray parts of his field for weeds two times in the previous three
weeks, and contacted the sprayer to see if he had noticed the
circles. Although the area where the circles were located had
not been sprayed, the sprayer said that he hadn’t seen the
circles the first time he sprayed, but when he had sprayed the
field two weeks later, he had noticed them, but didn’t bother
to mention it to Mr. Esper at the time. Therefore, we can only
narrow down the time of formation to this two-week window of time
from about July 10-24.
Plant Anomalies
Mr. Esper
recalled that the spraying company would not come to spray his
field unless the moisture content of his wheat plants was less
than 35%. Consequently, the wheat was in a very dry state when
this formation occurred. Still, as low as the moisture content
was, many of the plants inside these circles show the result of
the formative energies in the form of massive expulsion cavities
(blown node collars), and a slightly different anomaly that we
are calling ‘expulsion fissures’. In our previous
Kekoskee / Mayville, Wisconsin report we documented the existence
of the blown node collars / expulsion cavities which we also found
in this formation. However, we also uncovered these ‘expulsion
fissures’ that seem to be the result of the flash heating
by whatever energy was responsible for this event, but because
of the lack of internal moisture, internally ruptured and created
these fissures (see photo). Microscopic analysis at a magnification
of 30x shows that the upper surface of these expulsion fissures
have ruptured horizontally and the edges are pulled back slightly.
These expulsion fissures were not found in any of the standing
wheat left up around the larger circle, nor in a swath of wheat
missed by the combine found 200 feet to the North.
[View
of one of the many expulsion fissures from the flattened stalks
of wheat found inside the formation.]
We believe
that this is the first time that these ‘expulsion fissures’
have been documented. Blown node collars have never been found
in any hoaxed crop circles, nor in any control samples that have
ever been studied. There is no known technology that is able to
duplicate this blown node collar effect on thousands of plants
in these downed areas of crop fields. However, putting stems into
a microwave oven, and cooking them for a short time have reproduced
this effect. The appearance, then, of these blown node collars
is conclusive evidence - in itself - that these circles were not
flattened by human-mechanical means, and the appearance of expulsion
fissures – a previously undocumented anomaly never reported
in standing wheat, wheat flattened by hoaxers, nor in previously
reported ‘authentic’ crop circle formations, also
adds additional evidence that these circles were not hoaxed.
We also followed
the L-NEAT (Levengood Node Elongation Analysis Test) scientific
protocol to determine if there was a statistical difference in
the measurement of growth nodes of plants inside the circles as
compared to the measured length of growth nodes of control plants
taken from outside the circles in the standing wheat. This test
positively identified the fact that the growth nodes of plants
found inside the circles were statistically larger than the growth
nodes of control plants measured from outside the circles in the
standing wheat. This elongation or enlargement of the growth nodes
of these plants cannot be duplicated by any demonstrated hoaxing
techniques. This positive result from L-NEAT test, then, independently
and conclusively confirms that no human-mechanical means were
used in the creation of these crop circles.
Bent growth
nodes in the past have been used as a determination of the authenticity
of crop circle formations, but that methodology does not always
work. Both phototropism and geotropism can cause node bending
after crops are flattened, although it has been shown experimentally
to take several days for those processes to exhibit a noticeable
growth node bending effect. Because we arrived at the formation
almost three weeks after it formed, we did not use node bending
as a criteria for authenticity.
Soil
Anomaly and Sampling
We collected soil samples from the formation, but we did not find
any unusual magnetic anomalies in the field. We are planning to
further analyze the soil samples in a lab environment.
GPS
Anomaly
The crop circle formation is located at approximately 42?36.04m
N latitude, and 84?00.04m W longitude. However, we were unable
to conclusively obtain an approximate feet-above-sea-level measurement
from within the formation. Our attempt resulted in a measurement
inside the large circle +858ft above sea level, and a reading
of +854 ft above sea level for the smaller circle. The two circles
were exactly 135 feet apart. Between the two circles, we took
a GPS reading every 20 feet and received elevations of +943-+955
feet above sea level. The area does not change in elevation more
than 15 feet across the distance between the circles, so we have
an anomaly of the circles appearing to be approximately 100 feet
in elevation below the rest of the field.
Considering
that our team arrived possibly three weeks after the crop circles
formed, we did not expect to find the presence of any residual
Electro-Magnetic anomalies. In fact, we did conduct a preliminary
Electro-Magnetic field measurement soon after arriving at the
location. We took measurements from inside the formation and from
outside the formation which showed no elevated measurements of
either electric field strength or magnetic field strength. So,
due to time constraints, and considering our past experience of
not finding high E-M readings more than approximately 10 days
after circle formation, we abandoned those tests. At this time,
we can only speculate on the cause of the GPS anomaly, which does
not appear to be electromagnetic in nature, but caused by something
else.
Crop
Circle Formation Description and Measurements
[Overhead
aerial photo of the main part of the circle formation]
The Howell,
Michigan formation appears at first glance to be a relatively
simple design, but in fact turns out to have some unprecedented
complexity not seen before in a crop circle formation. All of
the media stories and reports so far have reported on two circles:
the large circle (what we have named Circle #1) is an ellipse
measuring about 48’-52’ in diameter with two straight
pathways extending from the circle at opposing directions –
one to the E/NE and another to the W/SW. What the previous reports
have not mentioned (because it was undiscovered until we found
this) is that there are four additional circles underneath the
lay of Circle #1!
[First of
the four circles swirled first before being covered up by the
lay of Circle #1.]
I noticed
the first one as I was pointing out the multiple layers I had
seen to Roger Sugden.
In pulling back the counter-clockwise lay of Circle #1, I uncovered
a 3’ diameter circle, also swirled counter-clockwise exactly
3’ from the outside perimeter. It was also located in the
due South position inside Circle #1. I just guessed that there
might be more, and that they might be located on the cardinal
points. This was exactly the case. We found four smaller circles,
one located at each of the cardinal points around Circle #1 that
had been swirled down BEFORE the larger 52’ diameter circle
had been flattened over the top of them.
E/NE
Pathway – measurements: 11’ 5” long (Flattened
from W/SW to E/NE) by 2’1” wide, and had a slight
curve to the NE.
W/SW
Pathway – measurements: 12’ 11” long (Flattened
from E/NE to W/SW) by 2’wide, and had a slight curve to
the SW.
These pathways
were flattened away from the central circle, and were not exactly
opposite each other but were ‘offset’ so that the
North facing edge of the E/NE pathway is in line with the South
facing edge of the W/SW pathway.
Circle
#1 – measurements: large circle swirled counter-clockwise,
with two opposing pathways and four circles swirled underneath;
radius’ distances from the center swirl to outside edge
measured 23’1” – 28’ 4”
N/S – 48’ 2” diameter
NW/SE – 49’ 2” diameter
E/W – 51’ 9” diameter
NE/SW - 51’ 9” diameter
The
four circles underneath the Circle #1 lay were all swirled counter-clockwise,
and their measurements were:
1a. North circle: 3’ diameter; 3’ from perimeter
1b. East circle: 6’ 4” diameter; right to the perimeter
edge and pathway edge
1c. South circle: 3’ diameter; 3’ from perimeter
1d. West circle: 4’ 7” diameter; right to the perimeter
edge and pathway edge
[Photo showing
the locations of the four circles underneath Circle #1, and the
‘hourglass’ shading.]
Circle #1’s
lay of the crop was extremely impressive. The wheat was of the
delicate ‘bearded hairs’-type variety, and was undamaged
when first found. The lay had a ‘hourglass’ shading
effect produced by changes in light reflections from the swirl.
There were in several places instances of multiple layering in
addition to finding the four circles swirled underneath the main
circle’s lay.
[Photo showing
the ribbons and braiding effect.]
There was
also a ‘ribboned’ and ‘braiding’ effect
towards the outer edge of the circle, while nearest to the center
of the circle, the stalks of wheat were woven into a very tight
spiral.
[Photo showing
the woven center of Circle #1.]
Circle
#2 – measurements: small circle swirled counter-clockwise;
radius’ distances from the center swirl to outside edge
measured 4’5” – 5’ 11”
N/S – 10’ 3” diameter
NW/SE – 10’ 4” diameter
E/W – 10’ 6” diameter
NE/SW - 10’ 5” diameter
[Photo of
Circle #2 showing the remnant swirl after the combine has harvested
over it.]
In an extensive
search of the crop circle literature, we believe this is the first
time that multiple circles in a formation have appeared, and then
a larger circle has been flattened right over the top of the original
circles.
Additional
Circle Added Later
On July 31,
I received another call from Mr. Esper late in the day to tell
me he had found another crop circle in the same field as the previously
reported formation. Roger
Sugden and I had left the field the previous night at about
9:30 pm EDT, and the circle was not there. Mr. Esper called me
after finding it about 6:30 pm EDT the next day. It appeared during
this ~18 hour time frame. There was no unusual weather during
that time period. Knowing that the field had already been harvested,
I was curious as to where this circle was located. He told me
that this new circle appeared in the standing wheat that he had
left up bordering around Circle #1. I arrived at the formation
location after dark, and measured the new circle at 6’ 7”
in diameter. The circle was swirled counter-clockwise and right
to the edge of the harvested wheat. I did not detect any elevated
readings with my Geiger counter, and no elevated readings in electric
field strength or magnetic field strength. I spent at least a
half an hour looking for expulsion cavities in this small circle
but I found none. We cannot conclusively make a determination
of the authenticity of this additional circle, but we would say
it is a probable hoax.
[Photo of
added circle.]
Crop
Circle Location Geology and Context
Arriving
at the field, we noticed a special blue road sign reading “Wellhead
Protection Area.” Inquiring as to what this designation
meant, it turns out that the field marks the beginning of the
boundary of where a specially protected area has been defined
to protect the local watershed from certain polluting industries,
and where the city of Howell draws its water supply. The field
where the crop circle formation appeared has two large wells –
one of which helps supply the city with water. Also located about
100’ East of Circle #1 is a drain field that empties into
a swamp at the North border of the field. The field itself sits
on top of a large aquifer and a layer of sandstone that is being
mined by a cement company less than a mile to the West of the
field. Between the cement company and the Western border of the
field is a branch of the Red Cedar River. Crop circles have been
noted to appear near some sort of body of water: a creek, a pond,
a drainage ditch, etc, and with this formation, water appears
to be in plentiful supply all around – and below- this formation.
Crop Circles
have also been known to form in close proximity to power lines,
and again this circle site is no exception – less than 15
feet from Circle #2 is power line with a transformer box on it.
We also were
told that an Indian Mound archaeological site had recently been
uncovered in Cedar Lake, Michigan a few miles away, and we are
working to confirm the location of this site.
Conclusions
Our research team had at this point in our investigation enough
conclusive scientific evidence as well as a body of supporting
contextual detail to show that the Howell crop circle formation
had not been hoaxed by people using mechanical means, and that
the evidence uncovered supports the conclusion that this is an
authentic formation. There are other anomalies that were detected
in this formation, but until our lab studies are concluded, and
we are certain of our findings, we will refrain from reporting
those at this time.
Acknowledgements
Our scientific
research team would like to thank Mr. and Mrs. Esper for their
generous hospitality and cooperation in allowing us to conduct
our research. We would also like to thank an unnamed group of
young gentlemen who graciously helped us collect plant samples
as the daylight was fast disappearing. We hope that by sharing
this report with them - and the world - about the crop circle
formation in their community, we can build a broader understanding
of the causative nature of crop circles worldwide, and set an
example for the collaborative study of the phenomenon of crop
circle formation.
Sincerely,
[UPDATED
CONTACT INFORMATION CAN BE FOUND ON THE RESEARCHER PROFILE PAGE
- CLICK ON THEIR NAME LINK]
Jeffrey
Wilson, M.S.
jwilson10369@comcast.net
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/jwilson10369
Dexter, Michigan, USA
734-426-3802
Charles
Lietzau, Ph.D.
clietzau@sprynet.com
Todd
Lemire
Michigan MUFON Chief Investigator
Roger
Sugden
Indiana MUFON Assistant State Director
zulu@rexnet.net
August 4,
2003
[All photos are © 2003 Roger Sugden, Todd Lemire, Charles
Lietzau, and Jeffrey Wilson, and may not be reprinted, republished,
or reused without permission.]
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