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Glory Days & maturity By Cindy Hoedel The Kansas City Star (MCT) KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Just before 10 a.m. on a Monday morning in late August, Matt Gearheart's pocket buzzed with a text from his buddy Nic Allen. A "weird hawk" matching the description of a swal- low-tailed kite had been spotted near the Wild Bird Center in Prairie Village, Kan., where Allen works. Gearheart's heart soared, then sank. Two of his worlds were colliding. year-old Gearheart knew that the rare hawk had been spotted only four times in modern history in Kansas — and never in Johnson County — and that it would be a new bird, No. 404, on his Kansas Life List. But Gearheart is also an architect who designs surgi- cal centers at Gastinger Walker Harden + BeeTriplett Buck in Kansas City and was just stepping into a meeting. For the next two hours Gearheart, nor- mally a paragon of unruf- fled patience, fidgeted. Finally, at noon, the meeting broke for lunch, and he raced over to the store. A serious birder, the 37- MCT photo From left, Nic Allen, Jenny Gearheart, Chris Fagyal and Matt Gearheart watch a bird through their binoculars at Pomona State Park in Kansas. Quivira National Wildlife Refuge. When he arrived, the parking lot was filling with cars and people and the tri- pod-mounted scopes of other birders who had got- ten word of the rogue rap- tor. Nationally, more than 48 million people participate in bird-watching, according to a 2006 study by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The study defined a "bird- watcher" as someone who had taken a trip a mile or more from home to observe birds or who actively tried to observe birds around the home. yard. The most recent addi- tion, a whip-poor-will last summer, was No. 130. Over his lifetime, he has compiled more than 5,200 checklists in more than 1,000 locations. They are all stored at Ebird, a web- site run by Cornell Univer- sity in Ithaca, N.Y., where anyone can maintain bird- ing lists for free. Soon, as if to reward the earthbound flock, the majestic black-and-white kite with boomerang wings and a forked tail sailed in and circled slowly over- head. High fives all around, then back to the office for Gearheart. taken him to every county in Kansas, all 105 of them. He has seen birds up close in tropical rain forests, the Serengeti and northern Minnesota during an epic ice storm. Gearheart's quest has He birds most week- ends, putting 30,000 miles a year on his SUV, and prob- ably logs that many again carpooling with fellow birders. Serious avian enthusi- asts prefer the term "bird- ing" to "bird-watching" because identification is frequently made by hearing only. In fact, it is not neces- sary to see a bird to add it to your Life List, as long as you can identify a species with certainty from its call. The technology revolu- tion — with smartphone apps that can load a birding checklist instantly for any point on the planet, com- plete with photos and bird sounds to help novices with identification — has attract- ed swarms of young people into a tight-knit community once dominated by retirees. Currently Gearheart is "mentoring" two high school kids who find rising at daybreak, strapping on high-powered binoculars and stalking rare birds on the tall-grass prairie more satisfying than online gam- ing. But the obsession that shapes his life took hold in the backyard of his child- hood home in Overland Park, Kan. would wake with the sun and scramble up trees to watch birds before his par- ents were out of bed. He started his Life List (an honor-system record birders keep of species they have identified with certain- ty) at age 10 after spotting bald eagles near the Iatan power plant near Weston. "I was so thrilled and At age 4, Gearheart exceptional vision to be a birder, but Gearheart does. A fellow birder, Mark Land of Overland Park, says if Gearheart had been alive during World War II he would have been one of those pilots who can spot an enemy plane 10 miles away. You don't have to have It is the Life Lists that fuel Gearheart's feathered fancy. He lacks the cut- throat competitiveness that drives some birders to pur- sue what they call a Big Year: a quest to see the most birds in a defined area in a single calendar year. That extreme form of the birding was the subject of "The Big Year," a film star- ring Jack Black, Steve Mar- tin and Owen Wilson that came out last year. The movie was very loosely based on a 2004 true-life account by Mark Obmascik of three birders vying to see the most birds in North America in a year. The watery sun is still of speech, as well. They do not speak in hushed tones, as one might expect, but they do speak in fragments. Interruptions are complete- ly permissible so never apologized for, and broken- off stories are continued after minute-long breaks with not so much as a "like I was saying …" The effect is something lifestyles Young bird-watchers flock to retirees' hobby Some seniors rethink the mortgage-free retirement plan By Kathleen Lynn The Record (MCT) When Helen Berkenbush's husband began having health problems in 2008, the Clifton, N.J., couple decided to rev up their efforts to wipe out the mort- gage on their two-family home. "Any extra dollar we had, we threw at the mortgage," she said. Using tax refunds, overtime payments and sav- ings, the couple paid off their loan within a couple of years. "I am so glad we did," said Helen Berkenbush, 73, a retired secretary whose husband died in April. "If I had that mortgage, I could not stay in my house." Janet McMullan, 69, of River Edge, N.J., has made a different decision about home debt. She still carries a mortgage and home equity loan, because to pay them off, she'd have to withdraw money from her individual retirement account, and pay taxes on it. Saturday, October 27, 2012 – Daily News 7A like this: "A couple weeks ago I was heading up to the airport … did you get that red-breasted nuthatch? … to go to Louisiana to look at a work project … that's a big kettle of Franklin gulls up there, what do you think, 10,000? … so I swung up to Smithville on the way because … do you want to try to call in the eastern phoebe with a barn owl screech? … Nic had texted me that a red phalarope, this high Arctic shorebird, had been seen … there it is! Did you get it?" low over the dam at Melvern Lake south of Topeka in Osage County, and air is bright but cool on the second morning of fall as the Gearhearts and bird- ing friends Nic Allen of Overland Park and Chris Fagyal of Lenexa climb out of Matt's gray SUV. excited," Gearheart recalls, flashing his easy smile just thinking about it. "It stuck." Actually, Kansas is a fortuitous place for a bud- ding birder to grow up. The state punches above its weight when it comes to numbers and varieties of birds that live or pass through it. So does Mis- souri. ly below two major migra- tory corridors, the Central Flyway (Kansas) and the Mississippi Flyway (Mis- souri). The two states lie direct- But birders will tell you the most important sense for bird-watching is proba- bly hearing, and Gear- heart's ability to detect faint bird sounds out of ambient noise is "like a sixth sense," he says. Once while he was camping in the Ozarks the dawn chorus was strong, but he picked out more than 20 species of birds before he unzipped his tent. Gearheart is vice presi- dent of the Kansas Ornitho- logical Society, has served on the board of directors for Burroughs Audubon Soci- ety of Greater Kansas City and sits on the board of trustees for Audubon of Kansas. More important for his standing among local birders, he has an enviable Life List. Once, a team conducting a midnight-to-midnight count in Kansas logged 225 birds, one of the highest single-day totals for any state. Birders from other states often flock to Kansas to see prairie birds, such as greater and lesser prairie chickens, and to visit the big salt marshes in central Kansas: Cheyenne Bottoms and Gearheart has logged 1,788 species in his world list and 624 for North America, as defined by the American Birding Associa- tion (the United States including Alaska but not Hawaii plus Canada). In addition to the 404 birds on his Life List for Kansas, Gearheart has lists for 26 other states and a dozen countries. He also keeps a list for his back- None of the birding party is wearing nerdy bush shorts, straw safari helmets or knee socks. But they have identifiable markings and behaviors nevertheless. Binocular harnesses crisscross their backs, and their jackets are multipock- eted and stuffed with the high-tech tools of their hobby: iPods loaded with bird calls, portable speakers to amplify the recorded sounds, smartphones equipped with GPS and the BirdsEye app, which has current information on what other birders are find- ing and where. expensive toys from the back of the vehicle: Bush- nell Elite binoculars with 8x magnification (around $1,000 retail), a Swarovski spotting scope with a 60x view ($2,000-$3,000), a Manfrotto tripod ($200- $300). The guys unload the When four people are talking like that it takes some practice to sort out the layers of information. After half an hour at the water's edge, the group packs up the tripod and scope to move to a wooded walking trail, conducting a fractured conversation about an upcoming two- week trip to Ecuador, when a car approaches. "That's Jim Malcolm "It makes no sense to take money out of my IRA because that's taxed," said McMullan, a retired financial-services executive. Paying off the mortgage before retirement has been the goal of generations of homeowners; some even celebrated with a mortgage-burning party. But an increasing number of households carry housing debt into their retirement years, according to the Federal Reserve's Survey of Consumer Finances. Almost 1 in every 3 — 29 percent — of retired households had housing debt in 2010, up from 16.7 percent in 1989. The median amount of retirees' housing debt also tripled in that time, to about $61,000, adjusted for inflation. Even among the oldest households — headed by people age 75 and up — 1 in every 5 had housing debt, up from 5.8 percent in 1989. These families were able to trade up to larger homes or borrow against their equity when property values ballooned during the last decade and lenders loosened their credit standards. As a result, many people took on mountains of home debt to pay off credit cards and to finance bigger houses, home improvements or college tuitions. That means more households now head into retire- ment with high monthly payments, just at the time their incomes are sliding. AARP, the advocacy group for older Americans, is not happy about the trend and recommends that homeowners try to pay off their mortgage before retirement. "The more they can reduce their expenses when they're not working, the better off they'll be," said Jean Setzfand, AARP's vice president for financial security. "The mortgage payment is one thing that's predictable, and a goal that people should work for, in terms of removing that expense from their ledger." Lauren Locker, a fee-only financial planner in from Topeka!" Allen says. Birders often run into one another at popular spotting sites, especially during spring and fall migration. On the way back to Kansas City, the group decides to stop at Lake Pomona near Vassar, Kan., because Malcolm saw a rare pine warbler there ear- lier. A digital SLR camera with a long lens can cost thousands, but Gearheart practices "digiscoping," or holding a digital point-and- shoot camera up to his scope to take pictures. With a steady hand it yields good enough results for Gear- heart. "There's always a ten- sion between photography and birding," he says. He would rather bird. more slowly than most peo- ple, but only slightly — it feels more deliberate than slow-pokey. They have odd patterns Birders seem to walk example of what birders call BDR, "birder direct route," a common feature of weekend birding treks, especially in the age of con- stantly updated real-time sighting reports. Birders have other spe- cialized acronyms, includ- ing BVD, "better view desired," referring to birds that are identified but not seen well; LBJ, "little brown job," a designation for any sparrow, finch or similar species that can be difficult to identify; and UFR, "unidentified flying raptor," used when it is clear a bird of prey has been sighted but the species is uncertain because of poor light or great distance. The detour is a prime Spaghetti, Meatballs & Garlic Toast (served w/ choice of soup or salad) Shredded Beef Taco w/ Rice & Beans Tuesday Special: $8.95 Monday Special: $10.49 Corn Beef & Cabbage (served w/ choice of potato & veggies, soup or salad) Thursday Special: $10.49 Wednesday Special: $9.99 (stuffed w/ bell peppers, onion, mushrooms and cheese, topped w/ gravy) (served w/ choice of potato & veggies, soup or salad) Stuffed Burger Steak Best Homemade Pies in Town • Ice Cream Orders to go 731 Main St., 530.529.4012 open 7 days 5:30am-9pm Totowa, N.J., agrees that, if possible, it's best to go into retirement mortgage-free. But she said that tar- geting every extra penny toward paying off the mort- gage may not always be the best strategy. For example, anyone with credit card debt should wipe that out before paying off the mortgage, for two reasons: Credit card debt typically carries a much higher interest rate, and the interest is not tax- deductible, as it is with mortgages. It's also important to build up an emergency fund of several months' worth of living expenses before paying off a mortgage. And if you're still working, you should funnel as much money as you can to a tax-advantaged retirement savings plan, such as a 401(k), 403(b) or individual retirement account, Locker said. Some homeowners may be planning to pay off their mortgage only when they actually retire, sell the house and move to a lower-cost area, Locker said. For them, it's not as urgent to whittle down the mortgage in their 50s and 60s. Karl Graf, a fee-only financial planner in Wayne, N.J., said for many retirees, paying off the mortgage has psychological, as well as financial, benefits. "For a lot of middle-class people, the house is the most significant asset, and it's got a symbolic value," he said. Still, in some cases, retirees who can afford monthly mortgage payments might want to hold onto some savings rather than put everything toward pay- ing off the mortgage. That way, they have quick access to cash if they need it. "If the interest rate (on the mortgage) is low enough, sometimes it makes sense not to pay it off," Graf said. "Liquidity is always a good thing." Of course, retirees can always take out a reverse mortgage later against their home's value, but those take time and often have large upfront fees. Education News? clerk@redbluffdailynews.com Downtown Red Bluff Business Association & Many Business Community Co-Sponsors bring to you Appreciation Breakfast Veteran's 8am to Noon Nov. 11th Veteran's Memorial Hall Oak & Jackson St. in RB Plus a Peppy Patriotic Program with live entertainment Complementary to Veterans, Non-Veteran tickets $5.00 each Tickets are available at the Gold Exchange, Sugar Shack Café, Tremont Café, Crystal Art & Apparel, and at the door. Call 528-8000 for more information VETERANS HALL 735 OAK ST. Red Bluff, Calif. 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