Ford Times, April 1978; Will the Kirtland's Warblers Return?

The April, 1978 issue of the Ford Times featured a cover by Charlie Harper, with more illustrations inside. The article asks, "Will the Kirtland's Warbler Return?" The Kirtland Warbler lives in one small area of the world, in Michigan's Jack Pine forest.

The Kirtland Warbler winters in the Bahamas and returns to Michigan, to a habitat of under 50 square miles. The birds nest in the sandy soil known as Grayling sand.

Author Jean Ducey notes that at the time of her writing, the entire world's population weighed 12 pounds, consisting of 200 breeding pairs.

The Jack Pine cones only open with fire. The article states that the U. S. Forest Service completed a 500-acre burn and rotates the cutting and planting of trees on a five-year cycle. 

Camp Grayling cut back on tank training, Mio and Grayling provided guides and daily tours to control visitors, and studies were being made to determine the if the use of pesticides, area resort development, and weather change were impacting the populaiton.

Today, with continual human intervention to protect their habitat, the warblers number around 2000.

The Kirtland's Warbler Audubon photo

This issue includes articles on olden times childhood pranks (like outhouse tipping), recipes for carp, and baseball's wonderful fans. 

The Car Buy's Digest highlighted the new Ford cars.

The Fairmont EPA fuel estimate was 33 mpg highway and 23 city. It had "space age technology" with "computer modeling."

My mother had a Fiesta. It got an amazing 46 mpg highway and 34 city. It was built in Germany.

The Mustang II came in the Cobra II, Mach I, and King Cobra models.MPG was 33 for higheay and 23 for city.

"A Thunderbird for a special occasion," created for the Thunderbird Diamond Jubilee, had many 'custom touches' and rated 22 mpg highway.

The Pinto was a small, thrifty car. 35 mpg highway and 25 city.

Also included are the LTD, LTD II, Granada, and station wagons.

I am surprised by the decent gas mileage of these cars! Compare them to the 2020 models here.