Waterproofing trail shoes – is it worthwhile?

I sprayed them with CampDry. It worked very well at repelling light rain and especially well at helping keep the dew from morning grass out of my Hardrocks. It did not harm or change the shoes at all. There were no noticeable effects except that water beaded on the outside and my toes stayed a little dryer. I am more prone to treat them in the Fall and Winter. In the Spring/Summer I just let it go and when my feet are wet they just are.

I tried it once or twice but didn't find it worthwhile. When it's really wet, the "waterproofing" is worthless. When it's not all that wet, the repellant works — but then, in that scenario, my boots will become dry anyway as I hike on.

I assume you are talking about treating the leather trim on the outside? In this case, yes, Nikwax or SnoSeal (beeswax) are good treatments, but NOT for the waterproofing. That part of things is just a joke.

What happens over time and many immersions is that the original leather treatment wears off, leaving the leather vulnerable. In the worst case the leather will shrink and crack. You may have seen this with old leather things.

The beeswax protects the leather against drying out and cracking, prolonging the life and also keeping the shoe from shrinking. It sort of lubricates the fibres inside the leather. I do this to my wife's joggers, but we are moving away from having any leather trim on our shoes for this reason. I also use SnoSeal on leather gloves and my wife's handbag. Wonderful stuff.

Cheers

First, I'd second (;P) Roger's post and keeping the leather in good shape. From the original post, I'm not sure if by "breathable" shoe we're talking waterproof-breathable or just a straight-up shoe… If it's WPB, another reason to waterproof the outer layer is actually to improve breathability. If the outer layers of your shoe are saturated with water (100% humidity), the moisture vapor trying to escape your WPB shoe won't really have anyplace to go. If we're talking a non-WPB shoe, I wouldn't worry about it too much. Treat the leather if any. Presuming there's fabric, it's gonna leak. Some people would also argue that adding a weatherproofing layer of wax would impede the breathability of an otherwise untreated shoe…

OP wrote above: "but when it comes to breathable trail shoes/runners, is waterproofing necessary or even desirable? Will the waterproofing repel any significant amount of water if applied on suede and mesh shoes?"

To me, he's asking about waterproofing breathable trail runners made with suede and mesh — versus hiking boots. Anyway, seems like our answers thus far: no, it's not worthwhile.