Sleeping in a hammock

[Litehiker]

I am absolutely not in favor of hammocks for cold weather camping. You need SHELTER for other things besides sleeping, like changing clothes, cooking in a sheltered vestibule during storms and sitting out an all-day rainstorm. Do not try those things in a hammock.

I use a Tarptent Moment DW solo tent with ripstop inner tent option. They are good for 4 season use especially if you get the optional Crossing Pole for snow load and wind load resistance and to make the tent free standing as well.
I've used my Moment for 8 years in all weather and still love it. But look at all the Tarptent tents to see what suits you best. They are "Made in USA" in a family owned business and designed by the owner henry Shires who is the best tent designer around, IMHO.

Eric B.

 

[FrankD90]

Is there a particular way to tie a hammock off the tree? I follow every youtube video and it never works. I fell asleep on one while camping and woke up on the ground covered in branches to the distressed sounds of my friends seeing if I was alive.

 

[wboregon]

Is there a particular way to tie a hammock off the tree? I follow every youtube video and it never works. I fell asleep on one while camping and woke up on the ground covered in branches to the distressed sounds of my friends seeing if I was alive.

tree needs to be at least 3-4 inches thick. do not hang your suspension from branches.

here's what it looks like -

 

[FrankD90]

Yea I had one of those "falling" dreams, turns out it came true. Wish that would work for those "winning lottery ticket" dreams...

 

[FrankD90]

I should clarify too, it was tied to the trunk not the branches. Maybe they weren't thick enough or stable in the ground.

 

[Mike 338]

Is there a particular way to tie a hammock off the tree? I follow every youtube video and it never works. I fell asleep on one while camping and woke up on the ground covered in branches to the distressed sounds of my friends seeing if I was alive.

There's a whole cottage industry of folks who make special straps and stuff for hanging hammocks but this video is all I started out with. At about the 4:40 mark you can see how to tie it off.

 

[FrankD90]

I shudder at the thought but I might give it another try.

 

[Mike 338]

I shudder at the thought but I might give it another try.

I went down once. It hurt and I was sore for quite a while. I ended up buying some straps from DutchWare Gear https://dutchwaregear.com/ although I used that knot for a while. I guess a taking a fall will teach you the importance not taking a fall. I used that hammock in the video too but it was a little small and my shoulders would curl inwards and I'd wake up with sore shoulders. A wider hammock fixed all that.

 

[FrankD90]

That's a good point, the hammock I rode down on was about 2.5 feet. It could have even been a childs size one?

 

[dok7mm]

I've gone the route with backpacking options, the last 50 years. I "think" I'm satisfied with a light tarp, light bivy, bag and thermarest. You can pitch a tarp set up for different weather conditions using a variety of pitch options.

Having trees handy is nice, especially near water, but the tarp is pretty much an any terrain shelter. I can wrap in my tarp faster than I don my rain gear, when a sudden storm hits. Keeps all my stuff dry, til I move on.

Like every other type gear we use, there will be lots of pro/anti opinions on any shelter system, so to each his own.

My first experience in a hammock was in VN in '68, relieved an enemy of it. It was way more comfortable than a wet foxhole, but was open to incoming and often no trees to hang it.

In high winds, I would think there could be safety concerns, during mountain hunting, from limbs and such.

 

[FrankD90]

Thank you for your service. I think a tarp isn't a bad option, it's a good idea come to think of it.

 

[RockyMtnMT]

Check out Tentsile. 3 point hammocks that allow you to sleep flat.

Sleeping in a hammock makes you a bear pinyatta. Haha!

 

[Mike 338]

One downside I see to hammock sleeping is finding two trees the right distance from each other. Provided you can cut a strong pole though, you can rig a portable "tree" but that's just something else to mess with. Could be kind'a fun though. I've camped on ridges where a tight pitch on the tent was non-existent but finding two trees in my spot, that were spaced right wasn't going to happen. A sloppy tent was better than nothing.

 

[geocodyrgia]

With my single line suspension setup I can go between trees up to 50' apart and slide my tarp anywhere along the ridgeline. I use amsteel for my line and it has worked well. I use polyester straps of at least 1" width to go around the trees a couple times to go easy on the bark with a descending ring tied on a loop. I take my amsteel ridgeline up trough one side, down through the other and to the other side of my hammock (with an adjustable ridgeline between ends of the hammock to control the amount of sag) and that gives me my hammock suspension and tarp ridgeline all in one with the bonus of pulling my tarp more taught when I get into the hammock instead of causing it to sag. I hammock camp with the scouts pretty regularly, but would imagine it would work well for hunting as well as long as you had timber available that wasn't too thick. That said, I use a military patrol bag with the old woodland camo bivy and keep a down blanket in there so I can just throw it on the ground and sleep on top of everything with a blanket , with sleeping bag and blanket, or whatever combination works. It's not the lightest setup but it works for me and I'm not like most of the other Scout hikers always searching for a sub-20 lb pack.