Shelter

I do not know how many tents I have owned and used over the years. Quite a few of them. Even now there are four tents in our pile of gear that we employ in our assorted outdoor doings. A couple of modern tents, a canvas wall tent, and a small canvas A-frame.

Tents have some good things going for them, especially the modern ones with the sewn in floors and screened windows. Warm weather insects and crawling creatures have a difficult time getting inside to bother you. They do also afford you some indoor privacy when camping in developed sites where other people are around.

They also have some not so good things about them that make them impractical to carry on our backs when our two feet and legs become our mode of transportation … their size and weight being two primary issues … and that pack on our back is our home away from home.

The Big Four

Fire, Water, Shelter, Food

When it comes to shelter it just does not get any simpler than a tarp. One of the beautiful things about a tarp is that their simplicity lends itself to a lot of set-up versatility.

A sewn tent, regardless of its style, is designed to be set up one way. If any of the parts are broken or lost there is a serious problem when it comes time to set up camp. A very close at hand example of this came last weekend on our overnight outing.

We took along our large dome tent for Shirli and our little pooch. I felt no need to check it out before we loaded it. We had used it in the spring and everything was intact and in good usable condition when it was taken down and packed.

So we get to our destination and begin setting up. I unrolled the tent and got it into position. All was well. I pulled out the flex-corded poles and discovered that the shock cords on both sets had decided between spring and fall to literally fall apart.

That roll of gorilla tape in my kit had to be employed to hold the pole sections together and save the day. It took a little time to tape all those sections together. It took longer to tape the two sets of poles together than it did to construct my tarp shelter and lay out my bedroll. Had time been an urgent matter it would not have been a good situation.

About the worst thing that can go wrong with a tarp is to have a grommet tear out. But that is a simple problem to remedy.

Unpacking, setting up, taking down, and repacking a tent, even a small one, can be something of a chore that takes a generous amount of time. Even on a good day. A wet tent is just short of a nightmare.

There are times when available time is a crucial matter. Maybe daylight is growing short and you need to get a camp set. Maybe a fast moving weather front is approaching and you need to get yourself and your gear under shelter before the bottom falls out.

With a tarp you can be set up, hunkered down under shelter, and ready for a storm in five minutes. Or, in better weather, that few minutes of constructing shelter allows more time to gather firewood for the night, prepare your evening meal, boil water for drinking, and enjoy that mystical transitional time when the day critters go silent and the night critters begin their chorus.

Poly vs. Canvas

There is an awful lot of commotion and debate going on in the woodcraft-bushcraft-survival circle about this and what I offer here is simply my two copper cents worth on the issue.

I think the debate is a bunch of guff unless what you are attempting to achieve is a good authentic looking replica of a kit carried by a frontiersman prior to or during the Longhunter Era. If that is the case then there is no room in a kit for paracord, ferro rods, Bic Lighters, Pardner 12 Gauge shotguns fitted for using Black Powder, titanium or stainless bush pots, modern material clothing, and quite a lot of other modern imaginations.

What I see too often in this debate is what I call bushcraft bravado … that my kit is better than your kit because I have this, that or the other ego stroking thing.

Personally, I do not have any interest in adding the extra pounds of an oilcloth tarp to my kit.

Besides, for the cost of a good oilcloth, the average person can put together a good usable kit that will get them started and serve them well for quite a long time. A rain fly from a defunct tent makes a good usable shelter. That is what I am using in the picture at the top of the page. I picked up this one and a blue one at the Coleman Store for $3.00 each.

A good quality poly-tarp serves me well and I do have a preference for woodland camouflage. It blends well in a woodland environment. We paid a little more for the ones we ordered and have in our personal kits. You will not find them at Walmart or any of the discount stores.

Debris Huts

I place debris huts in the same category as friction fire. Knowing how to build one is something good to know and something that does not require a degree in drafting or building construction.

If we have a means to construct shelter in our kit then there is no need to invest the energy and time to build a debris hut unless we discover ourselves in an unexpected long-term situation with winter coming on and need the extra insulation against the cold.

Another thing to consider is that, unless you own the property or have the owners permission where you will be cutting living saplings to use in constructing a debris hut, you had better not do it. National Forests, State Forests, and State Parks have usage stipulations that need to be adhered to. Step outside those stipulations and you might very well find yourself paying a hefty fine and discover yourself banned from future access.