Denny Crawford, an officer with the Penn Township Police Department, counts out the marijuana plants police found Thursday growing in a cornfield off Hicks Road. The 150 plants will be destroyed by police.

PENN TWP — Police on Thursday made a nice harvest: 150 marijuana plants.

The 12-to-18-inch plants were found growing in a cornfield off Hicks Road in Penn Township, unbeknownst to the property owner, authorities said

A tip Wednesday led police from Penn and Middlesex townships to the 500-acre field. Officers suspected the information was good and conducted a helicopter fly over Thursday.

Officers spotted row after row of the illegal crop, said Middlesex Township Police Sgt. Randy Ruediger.

Police believe the marijuana was the product of seedlings started indoors and only recently transplanted outside.

“Some corn stalks were removed and replaced with marijuana plants,” Ruediger said. “No one knew the plants were there because they were hidden by the weeds and corn stalks.”

He noted that the plants were strategically laid out in sets of 20 to 25 “over a large area.”

Officers pulled the plants and took them to the Penn Township police station to be counted, photographed and destroyed.

“They’ll throw gas on (the plants) and light them up in burn barrels,” said county Detective Tim Fennell, who heads the Butler County Drug Task Force.

Fennell was hard pressed to put a value on the plants.

“At maturity, maybe each one could produce $500 or $600 worth of marijuana,” he said. “But that would depend on the quality.”

He said the single marijuana harvest is the largest he’s seen ”in quite a while.”

Ruediger said that the investigation was closed, and, short of any unforeseen developments, there would be no arrests.

“There’s not enough to go on,” he said, “in the way of suspects.”