They appeared like magic in the middle of the night — hundreds of huge geometrical patterns in the middle of English wheat fields. To some, the mysterious circles that first made headlines in 1980 were proof of alien visitors. Self-styled crop-circle experts claimed the precise shapes were the result of energy from spaceships that flattened the wheat as they hovered. "Cereologists" devoted books to the wheat-field wonders, and curious tourists flocked to see them — until September 1991, when two 60-something artists came forward to show how they had created the circles at night with lengths of rope and flat boards. The con that baffled the world for more than a decade had been cooked up over a pint in a local pub.

As the last of 1991's 160 or more British corn circles are mown down and the serious debate is shelved for another year, the small, back-biting, intensely jealous world of 'cereologists' has been struck dumb by the claims made this week of two elderly men.

Doug Bower and Dave Chorley claimed in Today newspaper and subsequently on world television that they were responsible for the lot. . . . The few British, American and Japanese scientists who are trying to research the phenomenon are distraught. Doug and Dave, said one this week, have set research back years. In fact they may have done the opposite. Fewer photographs will appear in the press from now on but the publicity may attract more money for proper investigation. The growing number of amateur and professional cereologists may have the last laugh.

On one occasion the BBC, in the course of doing a report on the phenomenon, snuck a crew of wise guys into the middle of a field, making sure everybody walked in the tractor tracks so as not to leave footprints. The pranksters then formed a line, linked arms, and did a slo-mo shuffle somewhat reminiscent of a marching band on Valium. The result was pronounced a genuine crop circle by a leading "cereologist," or crop circle investigator.