What’s your problem with bivys?

[Chris K]

I’m playing around with a new waterproof-breathable bivy design, a standalone “throw down” shelter, and would like your general input.

First caveat: it will not work in an all-night downpour, or a significant snowfall. A real shelter is required for those conditions.

And of course, sleeping without a shelter doesn’t require a bivy at all, assuming conditions are good enough, which they often are.

I’m interested in the aesthetic value, if not the practical value, of just throwing your stuff on the ground and sleeping in it, with nothing to pitch, when conditions are variable enough to justify protecting your sleep insulation. I know some one-person tents are lighter than a standalone bivy. I know a tarp can add more value, in maybe all cases, than this style of bivy. As soon as someone mentions using a wpb bivy, the first replies are invariably “just use a small tarp and breathable bivy,” “get a big tarp and drop the bivy,” or “those are designed for mountaineers and are inappropriate for backpacking.”

My question to you is, why? What factor limits them, in your experience? Would you use one if [X] wasn’t a problem?

What is your #1 problem with bivys?

[Matanya “Wonka” Loewenthal]

As you had said, if conditions are good enough, you don’t need it. That said, I use a water-resistant bivy (MLD Solo DCF) because it’s good beyond just waterproofing. For me, the bivy is a 6 oz ground cloth, bug net, and wind block with virtually no setup time. If there will be inclement weather, then I bring the tarp. It’s less about how a bivy can replace a tarp and more about how it is a great (albeit more expensive) solution to a few other issues. Sorry if that doesn’t answer your question, just my experience with the bivy on the AT. Cheers!

[Jan Rezac]

I think the #1 problem is getting into the bivy when it’s raining. More generally, the whole transition from hiking to sleeping. I also like to cook and eat a dinner sometime in between.

The problem #2 is getting out in the morning when it’s raining. It’s not as bad as #1 as it can be faster and without worries of sleeping in wet stuff. However, getting out of the warm sleeping bag right into a cold rain is nothing to look forward to.

I gave up on using a WPB bivy as the only shelter long time ago after just a few tries. And I don’t think it can be fixed by designing the bivy differently.

Breathable bivy as a ground cloth, bug net and a little extra protection against the elements is great. Of course under a tarp, if it is raining.

[dirtbag]

Exactly!

[dirtbag]

Im curious what could be done to change/improve on a bivy to make it better then already is? Its such a simple, great piece of gear. Is what it is. I love that I can lay it down pretty much wherever I want, as long as my body can lay comfortably in that spot. It takes no time at all to set up my bed for the night, and less time in the morning to pack up. It keeps me sort of exposed to the elements and nature while filling my soul with that vibe from earth deep within. There is nothing really to break, malfunction or misplace and it takes up absolutely no space in my pack or noticeable weight, giving me freedom to hike more and less things to worry about while I am out there.

[Murali C]

Just too much work for me – which is ironic as bivy as you say should be a “throw it on the ground….no staking etc”. The problem is – you have to think – is it going to rain? If it is – then you need to put up tarp – as you cannot just go with WPB bivy alone – unless you are doing FKT and you are sleeping 3 to 4 hours and dont mind being wet as you have a bigger purpose – FKT.  In the last few years, rain has been inconsistent. In 2022 when I did the half of the JMT in late july/august, it rained almost every day – not afternoon thunderstorms, evening/night rains – and sierras are supposed to be dry or at least has that reputation. In 2018 I did the JMT late August to Sep 11. Was rained on only twice while many folks who hiked early August told me they had rain/hail every day. I heard CT also saw lots of rain in 2022.

So, even when I take a breathable bivy – I almost always use the tarp as I don’t want to deal with getting up in the middle of the night to put up a tarp. Though I have used breathable bivy without a tarp on 3 different occasions in PCT Washington of all places which has a reputation for rain.

Also, I would think, it will be miserable to be caught in a bad surprise rainstorm in a WPB bivy. Just the noise and the cold rain pelting the WPB bivy makes me shudder.

So, if you don’t want to think too much, it is much easier to just put a tarp and use a bathtub floor and use a head net for bugs. No worrying if it is going to rain in the middle of the night or when you get up in the morning. Much more peaceful no brainer decision which is what I like when I am hiking! And weight wise, as you said, bivy’s are just too heavy compared to tents/tarp nowadays.

Tents like Mid’s – MLD’s Duomid or DD X-mid are so easy and so fast to setup, that I don’t think there are any advantages to a bivy with respect to additional work of setting up a tent. Sure – bivy’s can be set up almost anywhere with a smaller footprint while tents need a bigger footprint. And then getting in and out of a bivy is a pain always and of course condensation – though it depends on the person sometimes. Some folks have no condensation in bivies while most do.

[dirtbag]

Fair points. Ok, so pitching a small tarp overhead for insurance on occasion adds another 3 or 4 minutes time, true. Still beats being in a tent or a mid. I have a MLD Solomid XL which I am reluctant to use over my tarp/bivy combination because I feel trapped in there, surrounded on all sides by silnylon or whatever material. Some may say they feel trapped in a confining bivy but for me it swaddles comfortably while again, leaving me mostly exposed to nature and all my surroundings. “So if you don’t want to think too much, it is much easier to just put a tarp and use a bathtub floor and use a head net for bugs”. .. umm.. yes I agree 100% totally with you on that.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[dirtbag]

@ Murali.. i just sent you a pm. Then remember pm does not work well on BPL anymore.. no notification.. so not to hijack or go off topic of this thread.. check your pm!

[Mark Verber]

I don’t like waterproof bivies backpacking. Not breathable enough in good weather, not enough protection in a storm and provides no way to “manage” wet.  DWR bivy can be great when no precipitation or with a tarp when there is perception.

I don’t find the speed that much better than other shelters once I have perfected my set-up method. The small footprint can be really helpful in some locations.

What’s great: as others have said little to fail, easy to manage, setup/takedown simple.  I would add that is can make managing a quilt easier… no worry that quilt will reach beyond the groundcloth and minimizes drafts.

When don’t I like using a bivy: hot weather with heavy bug pressure. I want a space that I can sit in, I can enjoy a breeze, and not get bitten.

[Jerry Adams]

yeah, bivy not good in rain

therefore, a heavy, low breathability WPB fabric isn’t good

just a DWR nylon will keep out wind, protect from rain splash and dew

Occasionally it starts raining in the middle of the night so I quickly set up my tent

[Ethan A.]

I spent many nights in a bivy in the army, often under the stars and sometimes in a shelter or bunker. Slept like a rock. They excel at reducing drafts. Much prefer a breathable bivy + shelter to a WPB one and would like to try one again.

[Moab Randy]

Chris, You are right to be attracted to the “aesthetic” of just throwing down your bed on the ground and crawling in. I find the nuisance of erecting any shelter to be very discouraging to me to use a shelter at all. I hate putting up tents! I hate stakes! With just the bivy, you are actually sleeping under the stars! which is a whole other experience than sleeping under opaque fabric, more the experience I am looking for in backpacking.

I always backpack with a bivy, a Montbell Breeze Dri-tech, long-wide, 8.1 ounces (https://www.montbell.us/products/disp.php?p_id=1121330). The couple of recent times I have tried again to go without I said “never again.” Not SUL, but I’m not a trail pounder.

I don’t have any problems with my WPB bivy use except that if would be nice if the fabric would allow complete elimination of condensation (I DON’T want it to be air-permeable, as I have heard Epic fabric is) and never produce a clammy feeling (but in cold weather I more often than not WANT the extra humidity). But that’s a subject everyone is accustomed to talking about regarding rainwear as well. And, as a detailed discussion somewhere on BPL pointed out, pretty much nothing will stop dew accumulation when conditions are right.

Understand that my perspective for the following comments is my predominant experience of 3-season solo off-trail hiking in the desert and mountains of the southwest plus the Sierras in summer.

1. Certainly a WPB bivy sack is a good idea as a backup to a leaky tent/leaky floor or to protect against dripping condensation and ice, and as a reassuring item in the event of an unexpected rain while sleeping out. I stuff my sleeping bag into my pack, with or occasionally without a stuffsack. This keeps it ready for easy instant deployment as a ready bed, but just as importantly is surefire protection from rain in a leaky pack. But one caveat: don’t think of a bivy as a replacement for a tent/tarp. Once you spend one night in one out in the rain, feeling that cold water running directly over and under you sapping your strength while dealing with condensation and contemplating the need to get dressed and  pack up without the shelter of a tent, you will never want to do it again.

2. But I think of my bivy even more as wind protection than water protection. With a bivy you can be reasonably sheltered in very windy conditions that would make it very difficult to erect any kind of tent or tarp, conditions in which just trying to open and spread out a tent or tarp will aggravate you and, worse case, risk having your tent or tarp impaled upon or shredded by adjacent bushes or trees.  Some will say if it’s that windy you’ll want to be in a tent for warmth, but I I don’t find that to be often the case in warmer seasons. I very very often use my bivy simply as wind protection, lying on top of or casually under sleeping bag, in very windy but warmish conditions. Without it, it would have to be full-on full-warm inside the zipped up sleeping bag—very uncomfortable. Sure, a light so-called “DWR” uncoated nylon might be most comfortable in SOME conditions, but would not provide the warmth of the full-on windstopping feature of coated WPB, or nor would it provide any genuinely useful water protection. Tradeoffs.

3. The extra weight is not 100% penalty.  It becomes part of your warmth system: It adds substantial warmth, so you carry an accordingly lighter sleeping bag. Yes, you could get an equal amount of warmth from a lesser weight of down or Apex, but those don’t offer versatility or wind protection or rain protection or incidental bug protection or the opportunity to contain your shed clothes, misc gear items you want to keep close in a big wind. And, importantly, a bivy keeps my sleeping bag clean and a lot of the dust out of my nose.

4. In addition to keeping scorpions and ants out of my bag, a bivy provides mosquito protection for the many nights I encounter in which they tend to come out mostly in the early evening and leave in the middle of the night. I shelter in my bivy, in or out of my sleeping bag, either completely in the bivy or, most often, partly under an additional length of fabric I now always carry, which I call the “drape”. The great utility of this light, very breathable but bite-proof piece of fabric could be a subject for its own thread, but suffice to say here that it is my go-to protection against mosquitos, not a tent.

• The Montbell I use is just a sack:
— No netting because there is no practical way to keep the netting away from your face, at which point the mosquitos will bite you. See my comments above about the “drape.
— Most importantly it is all made of WPB fabric—I would urge you to never buy or build a bivy with a non-WPB fabric on the “bottom”. I’ve done that twice and it is a disaster. If you are like me, within less than an hour of falling asleep the “bottom” is likely to wind up on top and then the condensation begins to accumulate.
—No zipper, just a drawstring. It is so easy to slip in and out of this decidedly baggy sack that it seems absurd to carry extra zipper weight and have the extra wind leakiness of a zipper and then to worry about having to keep the zipper flap pointed earthward in the event of rain; see comments above about “bottoms up.”
—It has a sort of “hood,” i.e., it’s built longer on the “bottom” than the top. This is somewhat useful IF you put the “hood” over your head and NOT under it the way everyone but me seems to use a mummy bag. If you were to be out in a rain this would let you breathe easily but stay dry. But mostly I use it as a warming hood while I lie on my elbows to eat or read a book, while still having good ventilation.

 

 

 

[d k]

I made a quick bivy for myself with a propore (think Frogg Toggs) top and silnylon bottom, thinking of just using it the nights we drove up to the mountains and slept by the car before starting the backpacking trip.  I first brought it on a backpacking trip where I shared a tent with a friend, just for fun, and the one night I spent out of the tent and in the bivy was surprisingly warm even though my sleeping bag at the time was not that warm.  I also used it on an overnight solo trip that had a hard freeze overnight, and was quite toasty.  Neither of those nights was in a buggy place or time, which would have been a deal breaker, or raining (likewise).  But it was a wonderful feeling to be under the stars and still protected from dew and frost.  And I could just sit up in the morning and cook breakfast without having to get out from under anything.

[Thom]

Condensation issues

thom

[Murali C]

I guess I never understand this comment most folks make – feel one with nature in a bivy or can stare at the stars etc….Once I fall asleep, I am out and don’t really get up until my alarm goes off. For all I care, I can be at home sleeping:-) Once in a rare while, I will need to get up and pee – but that is usually the first couple of days on a backpacking trip where I am well hydrated – once the trip progresses, I never get up to pee in the middle of the night- which is a shame because I would like to see milky way more often – which I have when I had to get up at 2ish from Guitar lake to summit Mt. Whitney etc.

Spreading my things in a bathtub DCF floor is much better than sitting on the narrow bivy to change etc – all of that matters when ground is wet.

[DWR D]

Tents and Bivy Bags are different animals.

Traditionally, Bivy Bags were part of the climbing world. They were not meant for comfort, rather, they were for some weather protection while sleeping on a ledge and often used while sitting up or leaning up against a rock. They were thought of survival things, not a creature comfort thing. A tent was not an option as there just was not any room to set up a tent. And part of that holds true for today. While a bivy may be the only thing that fits in a very narrow sleeping spot; you will not have the option of putting up a tarp in many of those situations. Bivys are definitely are better in good weather conditions… though I have actually dressed inside one while it was raining hard… but need to be a bit of a contortionist :)))

If you are going to hiking/scrambling over difficult terrain and don’t know if you will make it to a flat area before dark, a WP bivy would be a good choice… but would still want a good weather forecast. And could also take a lightweight tarp along on the same trip for those larger camp sites and potential weather. That’s probably the most flexible combination…

[Dustin V]

About 20 years ago when I got back into backpacking (as an adult with a job) I tried an old WPB bivy. I liked the idea of easy set-up, seeing the stars, etc. but as I upgraded all my gear, the tarp/breathable bivy concept was much lighter, less bulky and gave more protection. Every so often, I look into getting a WP bivy, but the thought of trading waterproofness for breathability keeps stopping me.

[John Vance]

After more than 50 years of backpacking and over a thousand bag nights, my experience with bivies is that they are waterproof OR breathable.  I currently use a bathtub floor mesh top bivy with a tarp for trips when the forecast is favorable.  Even with a full mesh top and under a tarp I have experienced some condensation occasionally.
I had an event bivy that was pretty good at shedding light weather and minimizing condensation in most conditions, but I didn’t use it for trips longer than a few nights as my bag slowly built up moisture that I couldn’t always dry out.   It was for winter trips with little to no snow in the forecast and just rolled out on the snow.

[DWR D]

“…the tarp/breathable bivy concept was much lighter, less bulky and gave more protection..”

yes… but two situations where that does not work for me… 1) just not enough room to set up a tarp… or extremely hard to do so… like: in a boulder field or a ledge where there is only a narrow slot of level ground wide enough for the bivy…. and, 2) above tree line in high winds where a it would be hard, if not impossible, to keep a tarp from blowing down..

Personally, I think a WP Bivy and a tarp is covers the most situations if you are hiking rugged terrain above treeline… and I do very much like to look at the stars at night…

just my 2 cents… YMMV

 

 

[Murali C]

I re-read Chris K’s question….he had addressed all the shortcomings we have all repeated:-)

I would love to use a WPB bivy if:

1) the bivy didn’t touch my sleeping bag at all – so that condensation doesn’t get onto my sleeping bag. If somehow there is a sparse mesh (like a pocket stitched to the bivy bottom) that holds my sleeping bag within that mesh so that the bivy top can just be a few inches above the mesh that is holding the sleeping bag. If there is not a mesh or something that holds the sleeping bag – then the sleeping bag is going to move around and touch the bivy. One way to fix this is to make the bivy with a high ceiling all around – which is not ideal – will become heavy and be tent like.

2) I would want an awning or some cover that extends from the bivy entrance (covering the bivy entrance) so that I can change into sleep clothes, remove wet stuff etc and then get into the bivy. This awning could be retracted when not needed so that it doesn’t flap around in the wind. I am thinking this awning can be supported by 2 hiking poles.

3) it will be nice to not have any zippers. Ideally, the bivy top is stitched to just one side of the bivy bottom. This way, getting into bivy is easy, then you just pull the bivy like a blanket from one stitched side to the other open side and maybe velcro or KAM snap to the other side….water ingress etc has to be thought of carefully.

Hope this answers Chris K’s original question.

[Murali C]

The awning is used when there is rain while setting up camp or when leaving camp.

[dirtbag]

Not sure why anyone has problems getting in and out of a bivy. My MLD bivy has across the chest and down the side zipper and my Borah Gear bivy has across the chest and down both sides zjpper. Both bivies are simple to get in and out of weather under my tarp or not. No problems at all to get out out or in at any time.

[YoPrawn]

I took a bivy-only to the Canadian Rockies, with grizzly bears around. Felt like a sleeping (attempted) buffet table every night.

That extra foot or two of tent wall sure would have made me sleep easier. It’s nice to have a warning, and not just snoozing…. and claw directly in the face!

A few years later I was at Mt. Rainier and one of the people up mountain of me had a bear come into their camp and start chewing on the guy cowboy camping on the ground, with everyone else in tents. Sleeping bag looked like a torn up burrito. haha

Person ended up not getting injured, I believe, but they had to shut down that area of Rainier for a while.

[Murali C]

Yes – the bear expert Stephen Herrero says that sleeping in a tent is better than cowboy camping/bivy camping in bear territory…..also he says have a 1 or 2 feet gap between you and the tarp/tent is much better….

DWR – getting in and out is okay with the side zip – I have used a Borah gear bivy with the same style. It becomes an issue when the ground is all wet and you are sitting on the bivy and then stuffing things into the bivy etc…it will be much nicer if it was completely open for me to put things into the bivy while sittling on the bivy floor….

[Murali C]

not DWR – sorry – meant dirtbag:-)

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