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The San Jose Sharks have Sharkie, the 49ers have Sourdough Sam, the Giants have Lou Seal, and until recently, Boulder Creek’s unofficial mascot was Albert the Peacock. For decades, Albert lived his life as a persnickety bachelor-life peafowl in the streets and treetops of the...

We all celebrate the holidays in different ways.

There’s not a year that goes by that I don’t plant some new bulbs in the fall. I may battle squirrels, deer and shade but come spring it’ll all be worth it.  Daffodils and narcissus are safe but what would spring be without all the other gorgeous bulbs to welcome in the season?

If you do not know what you are looking for, you probably will not find it. I learned that recently as Kristen Kittleson, county fisheries resource planner, and I climbed down a rocky bank to the San Lorenzo River. Immediately she saw a group of lamprey and walked out into the water in her waders to point them out to me.

Last year I was introduced to the world of bonsai. Santa Cruz Bonsai Kai president Ron Anderson gave me a private tour of his personal bonsai collection at his home in Boulder Creek. Shortly afterwards, I attended the club's yearly show held then in Scotts Valley. I arrived a bit late and the afternoon demonstration had already started. The sensei, meaning teacher, was in the process of turning a large 5-gallon overgrown juniper into a finished bonsai. The wiring had been done initiating the training of the branches to form a more pleasing shape and the root pruning was about to begin. All of us in the audience were mesmerized by the seemingly brutal treatment of the plant, but the results spoke for themselves. A beautiful, graceful juniper specimen displayed in a large, brown tray did all the talking.

The heavy rain wasn’t going to stop Evan Morrison, intake and outreach specialist for Supportive Services for Veteran Families with the Homeless Services Center, from doing his work.

Pro-Palestinian activists assembled outside the secretive Lockheed Martin compound in the Santa Cruz Mountains, Nov. 10, the day after a similar demonstration had blocked the entrance to the University of California Santa Cruz campus. The contingent was much smaller than the massive mobilizations in support...

The San Lorenzo Valley High School Theatre Department is gearing up for its production of “The Lady Vanishes,” a comedy thriller adapted by Derek Webb from Ethel Lina White’s novel, which inspired Alfred Hitchcock’s 1938 classic film. The show is directed by SLV High School...