Why did Brian bury the turtle eggs?

• A. So he could eat one each day.
• B. To prevent theft.
• C. To hatch them.
• D. To mark the calendar.

Answer: (A)

When Brian is stranded, every morsel counts, so the main idea at work is how he stretches scarce food over time. Turtle eggs are a potential, but uncertain, food source, and burying them gives him a way to store a cache and control how much he eats. By tucking the eggs away, he can come back and eat one each day, turning a risky find into a careful plan to ration his intake. This shows his practical, survival-minded thinking: he recognizes he might not find reliable food soon and needs a method to prolong what he has.

The other ideas don’t fit his mindset or the situation. He isn’t aiming to hatch the eggs—incubation wouldn’t work in his environment, and that isn’t his goal. The act isn’t about preventing theft, since there isn’t an immediate threat prompting that concern, and it isn’t about marking time on a calendar—the purpose is about sustaining himself, not tracking days.