Is the tent “free-standing”, or are tent stakes required to raise the shelter?
Tents that “stand on their own” without the need for additional staking are stronger than other designs. Stakes can always be pulled out of the ground during a blow, and additional stress can cause them to pull out if the tent becomes wet and heavy due to snow or ice. Rocky ground, or soil in deep woods can make it difficult to get the stakes in deep enough to be of value. Loamy or sandy soil is not beneficial to keeping stakes in the ground. During the winter months, the ground may be too frozen to drive in stakes at all, or too soft if there is a significant amount of snow on the ground. In the Eastern U.S. where snow can be an occasional event but frozen ground a certainty, attempting to find “dead weights” to tie a non-free standing tent to can be a challenge. Frequently, the dead weights are frozen to the ground too! A strong, free-standing pole system can only get stronger with guying and staking. On the other hand, many Europeans swear by the non-free-standing Swedish Hilleberg
