They’ve been seen and photographed at Katama in Edgartown, on Beach Road in Oak Bluffs and on windswept beaches from Cape Pogue to Aquinnah. Snowy owls are showing up all over the place on the Vineyard this year, and even the Island birding community, with its considerable depth of knowledge, has been unable to explain why. They’ve also been unable to get an actual count so far, since the birds have a remarkable range and can fly from one end of the Island to the other the way we might go to the end of the road to get the mail.

The power company resumed an herbicide spraying program last month, reigniting a debate about threats to the environment on the Cape and Vineyard.

Summers are a rush for leaders in law enforcement on the Island. But come winter there is still much to do, as police chiefs tell the Gazette in their monthly gathering for discussion about issues that cross town lines.

Revisiting Johannesburg, South Africa, 50 years after graduating from Witwatersrand (Wits) University, author and photographer Alan Brigish found much had changed. But not everything.

This is the season for gathering with family and friends, exchanging gifts, attending concerts and worship services and sitting down together for a big holiday meal. But as you pack the car to go off-Island or prepare your home to receive extended family, your anticipation is mixed with apprehension.

Last Sunday, after a quick pit stop at Chilmark Chocolates, I went on a long walk at Quenames, organized by the Vineyard Conservation Society and led by Soo Whiting. Quenames is a low-lying, flat sweep of fields shaped by centuries of sheep farming and patches of woods shaped by winds from the Atlantic, dotted by coastal ponds just behind the dunes. That evening I chatted on the telephone with my father, Albert Scott, now 100 and living in California.

"Guess what? Guess what?” Phil McAndrews, owner of Offshore Ale, shouted from the upstairs office. Phil is a tall, wiry man. He power-walked downstairs and marched toward me. “Guess what?” he asked again.

Last week we learned that the Vineyard Nursing Association — a critical health care resource for the Vineyard — is struggling with financial difficulties.

You might be able to catch the turkey in a large Vari kennel. Put the food all the way back in it and face it away from you so he won’t see you when you reach over to close the door.