Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Backpack Hunting Tarp vs Tents

New guy here!!

I've been looking at the posts here in the backpacking forum and I've picked up a lot of good info.

My question is about the tarp systems the some of you use. Is it just in certain places or times that you use them or every trip? I like the TIPI type tents with the wood burning stoves but the cost and space is a factor.

I live in Georgia so I'm thinking that the bugs and things that crawl around in the night wouldn't be good sleeping under the tarp system but in Wyoming it might be the thing.

Thanks!

Paddle, I use a tarp in a wedge design. I usually camp in colder weather, but I have stayed in some hot weather without bug troubles. I have not tried it yet, but a bug netting that hangs from a single point and tucks under your sleeping pad looks very usable. I plan on getting one soon. Here is a link to a picture of one...
http://www.dickssportinggoods.com/product/index.jsp?productId=4055618&cid=CSE:GoogleProductSearch

During cool or cold weather the netting is just not needed.

A video on this web site shows a good method to set up a tarp...just one way.

http://www.etowahoutfittersultralightbackpackinggear.com/backpacking-tarps.html

You might take a look at splitting the difference with a tarp tent. Nice lightweight with bug protection.

I do use one for hiking but bug protection isn't an issue here during the hunting season.

http://www.tarptent.com/

For back packing and back pack hunting, it is tarps all the way for me. The only exception would be for something like open sea ice or extended days above timberline in open wind. I mostly camp below tree line or at least have some brush or broken rocks. Bugs are not a problem during our big game seasons.

An REI double mosquito net we hung under a tarp two weeks ago worked superbly.

Have camped in tarps from -40 to sweaty midnights, and a few of those I've wished for a bug net! Insects would drive me to a tent more than any other factor!

Bulk, weight, waterproofness and handy versatility are reasons I prefer tarps for hunting out of a pack. Lotsa other good ways to get it done, however.

I live in Georgia also, and camp mostly in Winter in the Cohutta Wilderness. I've used all kinds of tents around here and I like bug protection except from about January through March. Check out the Mountain Laurel Designs for some thoughts too......I've got their stuff as well as a couple of tarptents . Its fun playing around with what works.
Don

Here is the netting I have in mind. I believe it will attach to the front point of the tarp and lay with the taper very well. These netting's weigh nothing.

http://www.amazon.com/Coghlans-9775-Hikers-Mosquito-Net/dp/B000HGMNOS

One additional option with the netting is when it is a clear night you could just use the net and leave the tarp in your pack.

Take this with a grain of salt, but I'm pretty much over tarps. At one point in my life it was all I used (I lived in CO and WY). In fact, I think I've still got more nights out under a tarp than I do in an enclosed shelter. But...

With the advent of modern floorless shelters, I just don't see a reason to go with a tarp. Floorless shelters go up the same way every time without eyeballing the site and making adjustments. They're almost always quicker to put up than tarps. They provide full coverage without worrying about whether the wind will shift overnight. If you want an open air experience, just leave the door open. If closed, they conserve heat far better than tarps. Some of them (like my new fave GoLite Utopia 2) provide bug protection and ventilation at the same time. In the winter, they make a nice roof for a shelter dug into the snow. A good one is more weatherproof than just about any tarp pitch.

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the romance and creativity of pitching your tarp in response to the environment. I've just gotten to the point that where and how to pitch a tarp is one less thing to mess with.

nclonghunter, that is a nifty net for the $$. I was also really impressed with alaskalanche's use of the MLD duomid nest in his SL-5. Made for a great combo shelter allowing for floorless open space for cooking and a stove if need be while still providing a floor and bug protection at an extremely low weight. LOTS more money though. The bug nests that Golite sells to go with their tarp shelters are great, but heavy. They double the weight of the shelter in most cases. I would ONLY carry them in warm weather in really buggy areas or car camping, however I live in Colorado. We certainly get bad mosquitoes but at higher altitudes they tend to die down at night when the weather cools and I'm actually in the tent trying to sleep. Zipping up the door seems to do the trick. No real creepy crawlies to deal with and if I did face that, I've heard that spraying permathrin around the perimeter of the tent (not on) does wonders.

I have a Supertarp and since I carry hiking poles anyway, I find it far superior to messing around with a regular tarp.

Paddle:

I'm hesitant to get into this debate AGAIN! There are a bunch of good guys who know what they're doing on this forum who advocate for single wall tents with wood burning stoves and no floors. I respectfully dissagree with them.

I think I'm also a good guy and I'm arrogant enough to think that I know what I'm doing. I've been backpacking for 50 years and gone on maybe 300 wilderness backpack trips in that time. I've used every kind of tent that you can think of and some that I made up, including single wall tents with wood burning stoves and no floors. I advocate for double wall tents with a floor.

Single wall tents condense moisture on the inside if you don't have a wood burning stove to keep things warm. That moisture freezes more often than not and when you wake up in the morning it rains on you and gets everything wet. I do about half of my camping in places where there's no wood to burn so a wood burning stove is useless extra weight.

Here's one example.


Here's another example where wood burning stove would have been superfluous.


Here's where I camped for one night last week.

The vampire mosquitos would have eaten me alive if I had been using a single wall tent without a floor. I'm not familiar with the intensity of flying insects in Georgia. But don't think for one minute that there are no mosquitos in the Rockies.

KC

Mosquitoes can indeed be horrific at high altitudes. Forgot my bug spray and came back with a huge amount of bites from fishing at about 11,000 feet. I lost count at 50+ bites on my back and didn't bother counting those on my arms and face -- the counting was to inspire some pity in my wife, didn't work. However, other than a couple that snuck in and met untimely (for them) demises, they weren't a problem at night in the Supertarp with closed up annex. If we were hanging out in the tent at all, a double wall with open door(s) and netting would have been WAY more comfortable.

What I do, which .. take it for what you paid for it ... is this:

If it's cool but dry, and there are no bug problems, then I might use a tent. If it's wet and there's any wind, I want a tent. If there are bugs, I want a tent.

By the time I get done packing a tarp, ground cloth or bivy sack to keep my bag dry from ground moisture, bug screen, and so on, a tent is actually simpler, somewhat lighter, and often easier to set up.

A tarp is a cover to keep the dew from condensing on my bag when I'm otherwise sleeping out in the open, no more, no less.

Tom

I used my single wall, floorless SuperTarp last week at 11,000+ . Tons of mosquitos, but no issues in the tent. The women folk used the floored TarpTent!

I'm no flat tarp expert by any means, but think the wind and rain we experienced one night would have given me fits in a flat tarp.

There are lots of ways to use flat tarps and especially floorless tents in bug country. With a flat tarp, a bivy sack and or a mosquito head net works well.

In floorless shelters, burning a small piece of mosquito coil will eliminate any in the shelter and if it is pitched tight to the ground like it should be, you will have no problems.

You can also do like Luke did with a mesh inner shelter inside a floorless tent. That way you have bug protection and the ability to use a wood stove.

I know you guys are camping in some gorgeous places, regardless of what tent you use. Great pictures, Thanks.

OK, grain of salt taken! and reciprocated!

This thread kind of took off since I checked. I wasn't aware of any tensions over tents/tarps, just personal preference to fit what we do with them, and swapping info on techniques. Lotsa ways, none "best" (though each has situations where it is best). That's a no lose to go for it with whatever we want.

It sounds like we here at the 'Fire tend to hunt or at least sleep in quite difference kinds of places. A fair number of my nights have been spent against the upper side of a big fir tree to keep from sliding down a steep slope, in wind caves, on ledges, goat beds, on game trails across steep slopes as the only place for a human body to lie down, etc.

The tarptents I�ve seen, like my Silshelter, are a marvel, and can be set up on a golf course if a man carries the needed poles and pegs etc.

My posts are tied to hunting bivvies, not mountain climbing, of which I've done a bit. Once again, tarps ain't for such barren wind swept terrain. As for bugs, we have a few on the Canadian Shield.

Browtine, if you tried to pitch a flat tarp in the spots where the shelters are set up in your photo, you are right that you'd have trouble in bad weather. For a hunter bivvy, without wife, maybe in elk season, back in that brush are probably wind protected spots you could sleep warm and dry with half or less the weight and bulk, but only if you want to.

Guys,

I had no intention of trying to start a debate or stir the pot!!

I know people choose different methods over another on just about anything we do.

I�ve seen in other forums where they argue over the catch and release of bass, shoot for meat or for the antlers, canoe or kayak, glock vs����� and so on.

I simply saw the tarp set ups and it looked interesting so I thought I�d inquire. I have put a tarp up while camping but it was to keep everything out of the rain. Most of my tent camping is during canoing trips down the river.

I think I would have too many bugs and creepy crawlers to use the tarp set up here but if I ever got on an airplane and went out west to hunt it looked to be an option.

I agree about the great pic�s and would love top see more of y�alls camp set ups.

Thanks!!

Don't worry about it, you don't know unless you ask.

This happens every year around here as hunting season draws closer, some folks get antsy and want to start hunting. The tension spills over I guess on some folks. I've been labeled as a complete [bleep] fraud this year! Too funny!

MtnHtr

Nothing like sleeping under the stars!! A tarp is the next best thing !! But I waffle back and fourth depending upon the weather as to which I'll use.. Added a bivy to go with a tarp..

One of these days I better just get both and give it a try!! You know what I mean!! Tarptent. Seems like the best of both worlds. Protection/lightweight A guy can find lightly used tarptents at a great price if he looks..

By the way Stacy,
Saw SU's new pack.. Pretty damn sweet...

One issue with tarp camping I've not seen addressed is how folks deal with fog or cloud mist? I've been on alot of trips where a low pressure system rolls in and you are enveloped in mist, (drowning in fog I call it) sometimes for more than a day. You pretty much have to hunker down as visibility drops off and game is hard to spot unless there is some hunting pressure. This mist works its way into all your gear and out comes the garbage bags and rain gear. With a tent there is still some moisture issues but its alot easier to manage and warmer by far.

And then there is the wind issue, I encounter high winds both up high and mid elevations. Its alot nicer to be in a tent rather than under a tarp, and some tarps don't handle gusts well no matter how well you tie them down, nothing like watching your tarp blow off at 3:00 in the morning! lols! (you're not going to sleep anyways under those conditions)

I can see in some situations where a tarp is better, mostly in terms of weight. But for most lightweight hunts I prefer a small mtn tent under 4lbs.

MtnHtr

I'll be in camp with MtnHtr and KC

I prefer a lt. wt. tent for bp hunting.

if I'm bp hunting, I'm working hard, so I need my sleep. Not having to deal with bugs, wind driven rain or as Stacy pointed out heavy fog is priceless for my hunting needs. To hunt hard I need to eat and I need to sleep, not be pharting around with mosquito coils or re-pitching a tarp.


no probs with those that use and like tarps, but for the type of bp hunting I do, a tent works best for me