Prompt 8

For my major you have the ability to do field research. What happens when something goes wrong while you are in the field? You could be stuck in the woods for a night or two and if you do not have basic survival skills such as shelter making and fire building you could freeze to death. This blog post is going to show pictures of my first attempt at building a shelter and fire building.

To start the shelter my team and I decided that we were going to build a raised platform. We took three logs and made a triangle base and then took 6 inch diameter longs and stacked them on the base making a platform. Next we took a thick branch that was forked at the end (looked like a Y) and wedged it at a base of one tree and on the trunk of another. This was support to the shelter. In the picture above you can see that we used thicker branches and leaned them on the support branch. Next we took smaller sticks and weaved them in and out for siding.

Lastly we put long grass on the side to keep it insulated.


My group thought this was going to be the best shelter out of the entire class. However when we were finished Dr. Hayes had a handout about the shelter you should build. The shelter we build was an A frame which is what you want to build. However there was to much space in between the roof and the ground which causes heat to escape. Also on the outside you want to use about 2-3 feet of leaves to cover your shelter. This will help trap heat in and it will make the shelter water proof.

Fire building is a skill that will keep you alive in a survival situation. It will keep you warm and you can cook and boil bad water. We built this fire using pine needles and grass. We didn't have matches or a lighter, instead we used flint. I will not lie we didn't succeed our first try. It took a long time to get it started but we succeeded. A suggestion that I have to people who are going out into the woods or camping. Keep a bag of cotton balls with vasoline on them. They ignite quickly and will help start your fire.

The point of this blog is to show how a hands on activity was different than learning from a book. A book can give you instructions or suggestions on how to do something. However in a life or death situation you do not know if you can do these things if you have never tried or practiced. In my field we work in nature so my Professor wanted us to have the basic skills so we wouldn't potentially die if we were stuck over night. This revealed that my field is more dangerous than previously thought. I should take extra survival classes to prepare for it.

Jake B