Adjusting Your Sleeping Bag To Suit Night Time Temperatures

A sleeping bag is a critical camping gear especially in sub-zero temperatures like in the mountains. With the technology we have today, manufacturers are able to produce sleeping bags that can even make you sweat in the coldest nights.

This is a problem if you are in a hot country or in the summer. Choosing a sleeping bag is not about choosing the warmest you can find. It's not about keeping as warm as possible but to regulate heat and feel comfortable.

It is important that you know the range of temperatures to expect when you go for a camping trip and choose a sleeping bag based on the lowest temperature that you might encounter. You don't want your sleeping bag to be too hot but it's more important that your sleeping bag can withstand the cold because when it's too hot, you can simply open up the zippers to let warm air out. It's only uncomfortable when you sleep too hot but sleeping too cold can probably kill you.

Another reason to choose a sleeping bag based on the lowest temperature is that it's more simple to reduce the insulation properties than to increase it. Slackening the drawstring is usually enough to let out the warm air in case you're sleeping uncomfortably hot at night. You can also flap the bag in a bellows effect a couple of times to introduce cold air.

All is not lost if your sleeping bag is not warm enough or cool enough for the weather. With experience you can usually gauge pretty accurately how much clothing you'll need to wear in your sleeping bag. In cold weather, it's always a good idea to bring extra layers of clothing. Nights usually gets progressively colder towards dawn or even until a few minutes before sunrise.

Whatever the temperature, you'll also eventually learn to adjust your sleeping bag by how tightly you need to pull the hood drawstring and how much you unzip it. You might need to adjust at some points during the night.

Sometimes your head gets too cold while the lower part of your body stays too hot. In this case, take off a layer of clothing though this may be difficult if you're using a close fitting mummy bag.

If you need to, you can also remove your socks and pants. If you ran out of clothes to take off, it means that the temperature is not that cold and you can safely open up the zipper half way or all the way to cool down. Some have zippers for breathing holes at your calves.

If you decided to unzip your sleeping bag whether the whole way or not, you might still need to re-zip it once the night grows colder. With experience, you'll learn more tricks to adjust the temperature inside you sleeping bag, which depends not only on your sleeping bag but also what's best for you.

On hot nights, you may use the sleeping bag only as cover, fully unzipped and spread loosely over your body. I know some people who keep their shoulders warm by wearing a shirt and their feet by tucking them partway into the foot of the sleeping bag.

The temperature ratings on a sleeping bag can help you choose but they are just guidelines based on many assumptions including the average metabolic rate, size, body fat and tolerance to the cold. The way to give the ratings is also different for each manufacturer. Big Agnes rates their sleeping bags differently from Marmot for example. There's yet to be a standard in rating sleeping bags.