SEATTLE
(AP) — Mysterious crop circles have appeared in an eastern Washington wheat
field — not far from the nation's largest hydropower producer — but area
farmers preparing for the summer's harvest find the distraction more amusing
than alarming.
"You
can't do anything other than laugh about it," said Cindy Geib, who owns
the field along with her husband, Greg. "You just kind of roll with the
theory it's aliens and you're special because aliens chose your spot."
Friends
called the Geibs on July 24 when the pattern of flattened wheat was spotted off
Highway 174, about five miles north of the town of Wilbur. The field is about
10 miles south of the Grand Coulee dam, which the Bureau of Reclamation says is
the largest hydropower producer in the United States.
The circles
resemble a four-leaf clover and remind Cindy Geib of Mickey Mouse ears. The
design knocked down about an acre of their wheat. Some of it could be salvaged
by combines when the harvest starts in a week or two, she said, but some will
be lost.
"Of
course, we don't have alien insurance," she said.
Crop
circles have been a worldwide phenomenon for decades, and this is not the first
one in Lincoln County. Similar circular patterns were left in crops in the
Wilbur area in 2010 and in 2008 or 2009, Geib said.
Lynne
Brougher, public affairs officer for the Grand Coulee dam, hadn't heard about
the latest crop circles but said the previous one was no cause for alarm.
"It
seemed to be highly unusual," Brougher said. "As I recall from a
couple of years ago, there was no good explanation of how they got there."
Still, she
added, "it wasn't a concern."
The latest
crop circle was first reported Tuesday by Spokane station KHQ-TV
(http://is.gd/57FTpy). There were no signs that anyone walked into the field.
"We're
trying to figure out how they got out there without breaking any of the wheat.
It's hard to walk through the crunchy wheat and not knock it down," Geib
said. "At the same time, it's hard to think it's aliens. It's a bizarre
thing to wrap your brain around."
Geib's
daughter-in-law, Kelly Geib of Wilbur, says the crop circle has given the
family something to ponder and chuckle about.
"The
kids all like to say the aliens have come, and we're happy to indulge
them," she said.
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