Altoids Box Survival Kit

If you were stuck in any biome and could only use items that you can pack into an Altoids box to survive, what would you put in that box? This is the question asked to me when I started this project. The environment I thought of when creating this project was a mountainous area, like the Rockies. Most of the mountains would be covered in snow, but there would be lots of dry land toward the bottom, where I would stay. With that in mind, here are a few pictures of my Altoid box survival kit.

Here are the items in the box. They are ranked in order of importance.

One of the most important things in there are matches. Nights may be cold and any meat would need to be cooked. Matches provide fire, which provides warmth. If you don't have any of that, you die. An ecological term to describe why I most need matches is heat.

Next, I would have a swiss army knife. I don't have one at home, so I put a little pair of scissors in the box instead of a real knife. These pocket-sized multitools can be handy for many things, including defending against predators, cutting items, and getting/ killing animals that may be food. One ecological term to describe this knife is food-chain, as this knife would keep me higher on this web.

The third most important thing is a flashlight. First of all, a light source will allow me to see in the dark when night vision and light are important. Secondly, if there were any other humans in this area, the best way to attract their attention is a big light. This flat, pocket-sized light would likely allow me to have communication with another human being, who I can trade with or partner up to help each other survive. Since this tool is mostly used for interaction with another human, the ecological term I would assign to a flashlight is coexistence.

Fourth on the list is rope or string. This can be used to mend anything broken and hold other items together. Tying things together just makes everything easier to organize. Along with the next item, some rope can be used to make a fishing line. String and rope can be ecologically defined as an all-purpose surviving tool.

Paper clips are the next item on this list. As stated earlier, paper clips can be folded into the shape of fish hooks. I assume that fish would be my primary source of food if I was in this environment. Along with that, paper clips can be folded into hooks to defend me from other animals. Ecologically, paper clips are for interaction with other species.

Along with all of these other tools, I have a gauze. If I am alone in the middle of nowhere and get hurt, no medical attention is close meaning that I need to help myself or die. A gauze would stop bleeding and help me in the most desperate times. Knowing that these pads are used to improve the safety of someone, I would assign it the ecological terms safety and medical help.

One necessity of humans is energy. To survive, we must have a source of energy and use it efficiently if we don't have much of it. If I could not find anything edible, I would eat the Altoids that I brought with me. Along with providing energy, they provide sugar, which would give me a boost. Knowing that Altoids are specifically for energy, they get the ecological term, energy.

Virtual Ecology Lab

While learning about the study of animals and their environments, we completed a virtual ecology lab in biology class. This lab taught us about animals in several biomes and how they interact with other animals. While doing this, we also learned about the food chain and different types of diets.

Here is a table showing what biomes and food group each animal is in.

Some information about the deciduous forest ecosystem is shown here. The animals are shown in their food groups. This chart also shows energy transfer between animals.

Virtual Enzyme Lab

In science today, we did an online lab about how enzymes, substrates, and pH affect each other. Here is a graph showing how they react at 37 degrees Celsius. The different colors represent different pH levels. The higher bars means that more molecules were created. One interesting fact that I learned is that there is no difference between 4 grams and 8 grams of substrate. If you look at the graph, the amount of molecules formed per minute is exactly the same in those two measures.