Flooring or bedding a shelter

[comanighttrain]

So... you throw up your shelter, s'all good decent roof maybe some pines, nice and water resistant. You go to lie down and shock horror the ground is cold. What do you do to make some sort of makeshift bed (lets assume you at least have a good knife)

[Marvell]

The key is an insulating layer of air. For this you will need larger branches than people anticipate. Most people assume you can just lay down a layer of leaves or moss, but in reality, this compresses and creates a wet layer of conducting material which can be worse than just the ground itself.

Start with a few straight limbs which are about three or four inches across and lay them in parallel pointing towards your fire. If you are worried about them slipping, put some pins either side to keep them in place. That's your insulation. Follow this by a perpendicular layer of much smaller branches, no more than an inch across, say. That's your support for the next layer which is a further perpendicular layer if dinky branches. Now you have a bit of springiness. You don't have to worry about them all being stripped and perfectly straight, so long as nothing is pointing up towards you. Finish off with layers consisting of decreasing sizes of leafy branches, pines, bracken or grasses; that's the comfort layer.

You now have a soft, springy, stable and insulating bed which is way more comfortable than most commercially available outdoor mattresses. Over time, you'll only need to add to the top layer, as it compresses and withers.

Simple principals leading to excellent results.

[JonnyP]

Dead dried Bracken makes a very good bed. The more you can gather, the better. Its a very good tinder too, so go careful if you have a fire nearby.

[Ashley Cawley]

Some good advice there Steve, thanks for sharing.

Both making a good bed and a good roof for your shelter can be very time consuming, worth noting if your giving it a go for the first time.

I like dead-bracken also, I've used that and leaves before as bedding but Steve is right it's best to raise yourself off the floor and create as much insulation as possible for a comfy night.

[MikeWilkinson]

I start with some fairly thick branches of birch or pine (springy flexible tree types) then progressively use thinner and thinner twig branches till I have about 6"-8" of ground clearance, I then Lie on it to compress it and build it up again till and repeat till I have 6" to 8" of bedding that does not compress much more, I then top it with Bracken, leaves, pine needles any soft debris really - do the compression, pile, compression on that till I have a bed that is between 10" and a foot deep with loads of trapped air within to keep me insulated and is like lying on a pocket sprung bed.
In summer I'd settle for maybe a bed 6" - 8" minimum.

I'd always say do a minimum bedding of at least 6 inches to not only insulate you but to also raise you up out of the cold sink, especially when using a fire.

Alternatively make a raised platform bed so that there is an airspace below you and build a couple of inches of insulation on that (debris again). You can then heat rocks in your fire and roll them under the bed when you got to sleep or keep long wood poles for fire wood under it that will absorb heat from your fire and re-emit it as the fire dies down (you can also just reach under and roll another log on the fire without getting out of bed!).

If you want to go the full hog, make up a camp loom and weave a debris blanket to go on top (I've tried this once, took some time as I wasn't used to using the loom, but boy did it look good when I had finished).

[Adam Savage]

One trick I have seen is to make a semi rope ladder from paracord and 1-2" sticks, tied between two trees and used as a kind of hammock, the shelter needs to be built around this type normally though, and also depends if you have paracord, could use withies I guess

[shashant786]

I too prefer dead-bracken for bedding (http://www.lifestyleshomedecor.com/bedding-ensembles). just need to be careful from fire.