"San Diego County is not the place. It's never been very conducive to dairies, and they won't allow new dairies. The last new dairy that was built in San Diego County was in 1971."

"San Diego County has more species diversity, that is, more different kinds of plants and animals, than any other county in the whole continental U.S., which is very remarkable."

In the time of Junipero Serra, Adobe Falls, at the east end of Mission Valley, was a year-round source of water for the padres and Indians at the Mission San Diego. Until the 1920s, it …

Mark Bucon’s plan is to spear fish at a spot along the Northern Baja coast known only to him and a few other guys. Five minutes before we arrive, he unties a black bandanna from …

The Barona Band of Mission Indians began construction on their new golf course. in May 2000. "The sod went in the end of June," Hillson says, "and Steve's well went dry in the middle of July.”

If you watched any local news in late February, then you saw footage of Billy Dean McCall twice shove police chief David Bejarano's daughter on a department-store surveillance tape. It was for that attack, and …

A team of San Diego artists are among 11 finalists to win one of four $300,000 public-art contracts in Denver. The site of the projects is the new downtown Denver football stadium slated to open …

For the last five years, Kryptonite, a manufacturer of top-of-the-line bicycle locks, has released a ten-worst bike-theft cities list. This year, San Diego made the list for the first time, despite local authorities' claim that …

James Adler, Chula Vista resident and Tijuana business owner, is out $5.2 million. He fell victim to an international financial scam perpetrated by Nigerian nationals and, his court case proved, the Nigerian government. Starting in …

To commemorate Father's Day, this issue contains a collection of reflections from Reader writers about their fathers: The Last Tag Sale — Jeanne Schinto An Air of Exoticism — Duncan Shepherd Kinder Than I Would …

I’m grateful to my father, Bill Grimm, for many things, the first and most fundamental of which is my life. As the 16th of 17 children, I’m thankful to my dad — and my mom …

“When you go to a fire, the captain runs the show, the firefighters do all the hard work, and the engineer backs them up. On a medical-aid run, Larry’s still in charge, but there’s a subtle difference.”

The area we're hiking in burned last summer when Santa Ana winds blew a local man's trash fire into surrounding brush, scorching hundreds of acres. Now, the ground beneath us is black with soot.

“The one piece of advice I’ll give you is, when you go out the door of the plane, to make your body as relaxed as possible. Don’t tense up. Relax and enjoy yourself.”

San Diego has been host to a number of public-art fiascoes. Most recent was Nancy Rubins's boat-hull leviathan, which was planned to span Harbor Drive. Public outcry sank that before it happened. That revived memories …

“I told you before that we were the big experiment in pay-for-play disc golf courses. Well, the experiment was successful. Now there are tons of pay courses, and the sport has gone nuts.”

"Did you feel how I used both hands and feet to do that? Now I want you to do it, back and forth between the lake and the bald spot, using hands and feet in coordination.”

At 6:00 a.m. it’s light enough to see across the field in front of us, even though the sun hasn’t yet risen. A shotgun report rings out 50 yards to our right.

Vintage Mercedes owners, lonely ladies, and San Diego retailers beware. Eric Erickson is coming back to town. Saturday, October 16, the former La Jollan and two other inmates walked out of a minimum-security federal prison …

What if you threw a party and nobody showed up? How would you feel? Or, worse, what if you threw a party and the only people who showed up weren't invited and you had to …

To get to Lisa Roger's house in the Eucalyptus Hills area of Lakeside, you have to drive past the sand-mining operations, tractor-repair yards, and prefab concrete outfits that line the San Diego River in this …

"I’m going to teach you two maneuvers that were used by Eddie Richenbacher and the Red Baron in World War I and are still used today in F-18s. They’re called high and low yo-yos."

"If we get up that hill ahead and down the other side without being stopped, I'm happy," Jeff says. We are on the road to Playas de Tijuana, the stretch where the border fence acts …

At the east end of Otay Mesa, where the business parks and trucking yards give way to open grassland, stands the California Highway Patrol's Otay Mesa Truck Inspection Facility. It's a sort of nouveau-industrial building …

I thought they were a myth. I didn't know wild horses, or mustangs, even existed. Turns out, 38,000 of them roam the open ranges of the 11 western states. What's more, you can buy a …

Chief of staff for city councilwoman Valerie Stallings: "last week she took a trip to look at animal shelters in Oakland and San Francisco,. That's a good example of what she uses it for: city business."

“Right where I went, there was Old Toby lying there, fresh-eaten. When I saw what that lion had done to him, an 850- to 1000-pound animal, I felt threatened. It made me scared to death.”

Don't replace your lawns and hedges with a native-plant garden to eliminate watering. "It is relatively low-water gardening for the amount of plants, but not no-water gardening," says Encinitas native-plant landscaper Dave Buchanan. Tearing out …

It’s now 10:00 a.m. and the rabbits are more scarce, so Faircloth decides to quit for the day. “We’re just not having any luck today,”

The American symbol-turned-subculture, the cowboy, owes its existence to beef. Before they wore tight jeans and gaudy shirts and played concerts in Central Park, cowboys were men who herded cattle across the great open spaces …

Moscow, Helsinki, Stockholm, Minneapolis; these are the places that come to mind when one thinks of fur clothing, places where the temperature can drop below zero and stay there for weeks. But since last April, …

It's one of those urban legends everybody has heard: the police auction. Porsches can be had for $500, 48-inch TVs go for under $100, and mountain bikes sell for $20. To test the legend, I …

You're a banana. For months you and your siblings have grown up in a clump, hanging from a tree in Ecuador. Life is good, basking in the tropical sun and rain showers. But one day, …

The walk down the Ocean Beach fishing pier is longer than I remember it. Three years ago I lived in an apartment building close to the land end of the pier, and I walked it …

“While we drift Shelter Island for the next half hour, I catch another sand bass, and Brightenburg catches three. But as we reach the end of the island, a wind out of the west starts to pick up.”

On the track in front of the home stands, cheerleaders arrange their hand-painted mega phones and pom-poms. The Helix mascot, a bipedal Scottish terrier, “Scottie,” wearing a Helix jersey, #00, cavorts with the crowd.

“Lucille was my best friend for 50 years. You probably remember her as Lucy from I Love Lucy, in which she seemed happy. But she was not happy all the time at all."

By 4:00, the sky over the Salton Sea has become a bird ballet. White pelicans in long, straight lines of 10, 20, sometimes 30 glide inches off the water. Seagulls hover in the strengthening breeze like kites.

'Body found in TJ River Valley," Kyle Anastasio reads a text message on the pager hanging from his belt. He turns to me. "You're going flying." The drizzly June morning we've spent lazing in the …

John Ashley meets me at the gate of the Kona Kai Club marina. It's 4:00 a.m., and misty darkness shrouds the harbor. Ashley, a vigorous, ruddy-faced man, leads me down the floating dock to his …

Julian caught our attention because it ranked fourth in SAT scores among public schools, despite being so small and so rural. The high school and the community seem to have a truly symbiotic relationship,

Lying on my back under a window in a corner of my mother’s dining room, I wondered what the particles floating in the sunbeam above my face were. Insects? Germs? Angels? “Dust motes” I had …

Why we wrote these stories Happy holidays, holy-days; Merry Christmas, Christ-mas. Once again, a voice cries out in the wilderness, this time a wilderness of shopping malls and office parties, saying, “Make ready the way …

“When I started here in 1971 as a sweeper,” says building supervisor Rudy Corona, as his flatbed cart zips through the hallways of Qualcomm Stadium, “I made $2.65 an hour. Now I make almost $18.00 …

“The thing I do first,” says John Thomas as he pulls a trash bag out of a can and ties it, “is I go around and grab the bags of trash because the seagulls will …

I would like to sing the praises of Lee Adams as one of “San Diego’s Best” at doing the dirty work. Daily, he cleans the dust, dirt, grime, gook, food, and feces (yes, feces, believe …

On many boats, the toilet- or marine head, to be technical- empties into a holding tank which eventually fills up and must be emptied, but NOT into the bay. There are pump-out stations for this …

Dear Reader, Jennifer Carlisle was a behavioral aide (teacher’s aide) at the San Diego Center for Children School for Autism for 15 months. She started working at the school only a few months after its …

“My work consists primarily of brain research,” says Dr. Phillip Groves, neuroscientist at UCSD. “The animals that I use mostly are experimental rats, laboratory rats, although I’ve done a number of experiments on different animals …

Mario Lopez, dead-animal collector for the City of San Diego, leads me to his white GMC pickup parked outside the City Environmental Services building in Kearny Mesa. It’s around 11:00 a.m. and he’s been working …