Potterne Field, nr. Devizes, Wiltshire.

Detail & Location: This circle was reported on the 28th of May and is the first reported crop circle of the 2020 season. It is in a field of green barley and measures approximately 200ft in length. See the Google Maps link for precise location.

Crop Circle Reporting and Covid-19: After considerable thought and consultation, we have decided we will not be censoring crop circle locations during the Covid-19 pandemic. There are no current restrictions in place in the UK that call for a blanket ban on visiting the countryside. We consider the reporting of crop circles to be in the spirit of journalism, and censorship to be an anathema to that spirit. Therefore, we will be treating the crop circle community as adults and asking everyone to approach the information carefully and responsibly. This will include not visiting the circles if the farmer has not given explicit permission to do so and should permission be given that they practice social distancing by staying 2 metres away from fellow visitors. It would be our very strong advice that visiting the crop circles on the ground should be kept to an absolute minimum for now. However, because we know that the location of any given circle can be important to researchers and those that record the circles from the air, we will continue to share what we know. 

Flying during the Covid-19 Pandemic: As of yet, because of the current pandemic, we have not been able to take to the air to record the crop circles as we usually would. We are, however, very confident that the restrictions keeping us grounded at present will be lifted before too long and we will be able to cover the rest of the season as usual. In the meantime, we are every pleased to have teamed up with the excellent AEROBO (Art in Flight) who will be helping us collect images and drone footage of the latest crop circles to share on the website. 

Visiting: As far as we are aware no permission has been given to visit this crop circle. Please do not visit this circle. Thank you. 

History & Connections: Potterne and other villages surrounding Devizes, have been locations for many crop circle over the years. This site lies close to Drews Pond Nature Reserve between Potterne and Devizes. There are a number of round barrows scattered on the landscape in this general area. 

Design & Symbolism: There has been much coverage of this circle and it has been immediately interpreted as an image of the Covid-19 virus molecule. But is that what is really been shown here? If it is, it is a rather cartoonish representation. On face value the circle could also be said to look like a giant splat of goo or gloop. Have a look at the photo here which shows a couple of realistic graphics of the Covid-19 virus and the Apple emoji of a molecule/virus/bacteria – what do you think? The Covid-19 virus does seem to have a geometry of some kind, in fact research into the geometry of virus when looking for vaccines is a new and exciting line of research. Covid seems to have a triangular or sets of three receptors in its arms, the crop circle does not follow this geometry. 

The outer perimeter of the body of the formation is made up of 12 circles, so this formation is divided up into 12 – some of the circular elements are on stalks of different lengths. There are then six standing circles inside the main body of the formation, three small, there larger – 3, 6 and 12 are all related numbers. One of the twelve outer circles is on the end of a very long pathway and contained within it are a collection of eight standing tufts, regularly placed in a circle. This is a nice detail. 

The interior of the circle is nicely flattened and swirled, initial footage and images show a well made formation with a flow at times, like eddies in water. Young barley almost always looks particularly beautiful when swirled inside a crop circle, its fine whiskers in the seed-heads adding to the gentleness and artistic ‘brush-like’ feel of the formation. 

I am not 100° convinced this circle is meant to directly represent the Covid-19 molecule. If it did, what might it be trying to say? What do you think?

Visiting the Circles? If you are thinking of visiting any crop circles this summer, please read our Visiting the Crop Circles section. It’s full of useful information and etiquette for visiting the countryside and the crop circles. Please remember that you should not enter any fields without the express permission of the farmer and you will need to be aware of and abide by any restrictions in place in the UK in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. 

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Please Help to keep us Flying in 2019: If you have enjoyed looking at our pictures and information please consider making a small donation to keep us flying. There are so few of us left regularly recording the circles it’s really important that we continue. And while some now use drones to record the circles, it is important that there are still images taken from aircraft where the best quality camera equipment can be used and images that include the broad vista of the landscape can be taken. This kind of photography is expensive and it gets harder with each passing year to raise the funds we need to continue our work, but if everyone who regularly looked at this website made a small donation we would meet the funds we need. You can make a donation here.

NOTE: Some of the images below are beautiful landscape scenes. Click on each image to enlarge them and see the whole picture.

Video Clip in partnership AEROBO 

Take a virtual flight over the Potterne Field crop circle!

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Geometry Gallery

This crop circle doesn’t seem to have an immediately accessible geometry. Check back from time to time for further information and analysis.

Please enjoy the diagram below by Bertold Zugelder.