Sir,
In response to Peter Hillmore's article "We are `The Aliens'" on pages 54-55 in the Mail on Sunday 3 September, I would like to give you a few facts so that the public are not misled by the contents of the article.
We are now able to distinguish between genuine and man-made crop formations.
Scientific tests show:
a. significant changes in the nitrate nitrogen content in the seeds against control samples;
b. changes occur in hormone levels that would not occur in such a short time scale unless therapeutic treatment had been given
c. changes in EEG (Electro-encephalograph) and ESR (Electrical Skin Resistance) readings.
d. Also bottles of water have shown changes in resonances and bacteria levels against control samples in blind tests.
e. seeds taken from genuine formations germinate more quickly and need less water during their growing period.
None of these changes occur in man-made formations.
Hoaxers certainly make a few formations but despite many people watching and monitoring the fields all during the summer nights, the only time they have been caught at night was when making a formation for the BBC in 1998. Also on a television programme, I once challenged one of the hoaxers to replicate a complex formation that he claimed to have made; the producer asked him if he would accept my challenge. The answer was "NO", revealing that he was unable to back up his words with action. It was a recorded programme and the producer assured me he would include this damning evidence. When the programme was shown, this piece had been edited out.
It is a pity that so much media space is given to these people who provide us with no evidence of their purported actions (except for producing diagrams that have already been put up on the internet for several weeks by skilled mathematicians, and who if they are making crop circles without the farmers permission, are committing a criminal act) when scientific evidence for genuine formations is readily available yet not taken up by the media. Is there some hidden agenda?
Hoaxers may some fool people some of the time but they cannot fool all the people all of the time.
I have dealt with the hoaxing issue comprehensively in my book `Crop Circles, the Greatest Mystery of Modern Times` and recommend that people read this in order to get a true and balanced picture of the situation.
Lucy Pringle