Can you recommend a gnat-proof family tent

January 9, 2023 6:37 AM

Can you recommend a gnat-proof tent for family car-camping?

This was me. Camping season is in full swing down here in Florida and I think my family is ready to give it another try. Can you recommend a 4-6 person tent that will be COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY GNAT-PROOF? Ideally under $300, easy to set up/break down, and otherwise well ventilated and good in the rain. Specific tent recommendations appreciated; I'm on REI's website right now and having a hard time understanding how to tell what kind of mesh a particular tent uses, and so help me God I will never again spend a single penny on a tent that lets gnats inside.

posted by saladin to Shopping (6 answers total)

Every tent sold at REI is going to be made using No-see-um netting, which will keep out gnats just fine.
posted by rockindata at 7:34 AM on January 9, 2023

I have an old REI Hobitat 6 that works very well. The steep walls provide a lot of internal space and I can stand up inside. But it is no longer made and the equivalent is 3x as expensive. You can find them used for about $200 which is more than I remember paying for it 15+ years ago.

Almost any tent made today will have mesh screening that will block gnats or any other tiny bugs. The problem is not the tent, it is the kids and/or spouse. (but never you, of course.) If the doors are left open then it is game over.
posted by SegFaultCoreDump at 7:35 AM on January 9, 2023 [3 favorites]

Have you considered one of those tents that has a "lobby" (a small opening area that zips up too)? By having two barricades it may reduce the chances a gnat getting into the "bedroom"
posted by treetop89 at 8:29 AM on January 9, 2023 [2 favorites]

Sample size of one: we bought a Eureka Space Camp 6 before a week long camping trip in 2021. We paid $311 on Campmor with a discount code, plus another $53 for the footprint. As a car camping tent it was excellent. The biting midges were ferocious that year (I had so many welts) but none of them got into the tent. We also made sure to turn off any lights in the tent whenever we were opening the door. I don't know if it helped us keep the bug count so low, but I also can't say it didn't help. For ventilation, it has what Eureka calls a "high/low" venting system, where you stake out the sides of the rain fly and pop open a few vents next to the doors. The resulting ventilation was much better than our previous tent, and the high sides meant it felt much more open than the previous tent had. The rain fly worked well to keep us dry in an absolute downpour the first night, but I will say the front opening in the fly was super awkward to deal with and we ended up with a puddle on the footprint in the vestibule. Thankfully our campsite was sloped just enough the right way to keep that puddle from flowing under the body of the tent. The front opening of the fly is my biggest (perhaps only) complaint about the tent, and it does seem to be a common complaint online.

Because it's a very tall tent I'd be worried about camping somewhere with particularly strong winds. I completely staked out every guy point just in case, but our problem was more rain than wind and I don't think my stakes or the poles were ever really tested. Speaking of poles, though, we had bought an REI Grand Hut 6 during REI's Memorial Day sale in 2021 but ended up returning it. The Grand Hut has a central hub for the poles, and the number of reviews calling that hub out as a big weak spot (and describing terrible service from REI if it breaks) scared me off. It's hard to know if the bad reviews are because of a design flaw, a manufacturing defect, or just people failing to stake their tents out properly in the wind. We later found out that some friends have car camped their way from DC to California and back, twice, with the Grand Hut, and haven't had any problems at all with the poles or the hub. They like theirs so much they bought a second one as a spare, but last I heard they're still using the first one. The Grand Hut cost less than the Space Camp did (especially on sale) and we probably would have been fine with it, but I do like the Space Camp a lot.
posted by fedward at 11:50 AM on January 9, 2023 [1 favorite]

The under $300 is going to be the challenge. To get the higher quality no-see-um proof mesh you'll need to buy a higher quality tent, a Coleman from WalMart won't do it. REI and LLBean are two I'm familiar with and have personally used, but for the 4-6 person model it'll probably be more like $400 than $300. North Face and Kelty are also likely good options. It's not camping season in most of the country, so keep an eye on the clearance pages at REI.com, you might find something.
posted by COD at 2:13 PM on January 9, 2023

Outdoor Gear Labs is my go-to for camping and hiking recommendations, and their "Best Buy" in the family camping tent category is the $270 Kelty Wireless 6. The review goes into pretty extensive detail, including that "The floor and fly are made from 68D PU-coated polyester material; the walls are also a 68D polyester and 40D No-See-Um Mesh." It also notes that the tent is quite easy to set up and take down and that it's "a solid contender in both wind and rain," though they also mention that because the rainfly doesn't have the greatest venting system, "if you find yourself in warm, rainy weather, be prepared to be a little toasty inside."
posted by exutima at 3:48 PM on January 9, 2023