Our doggies have been experimenting with a combination bag – this is where the base of the bag is made from the regular fabric, but the sides are made from a lighter fabric. (Sometimes, if I have an excess of the lighter fabric in stock, I make the base from a double layer of the lighter material instead of using the regular fabric. Either way, the base ends up having double the insulation of the sides so the end result is just the same.) So far – despite the fact that Pebbles often seems to end up sleeping kind of sideways in the bags anyway 🙄 – these are actually proving pretty good as a 3-season alternative, and if most of your camping is done in spring, summer and autumn, they are definitely a viable alternative to the heavier model. I do understand that if your doggy has a very thick coat (unlike a Boxer, for example) you may be able to push a Lighter Bag further into winter, as long as you use an insulating mat and a doggy coat of some kind, but for very cold winter weather though, when of course it’s not just low temperatures they have to contend with, but very long nights as well which can really amplify that deep cold, I would still definitely recommend the standard Woof Bag.
Another advantage of a Lighter Bag is that they pack down smaller and may well then fit in your doggy’s panniers (if you use panniers), so that you don’t have to carry it! Having said that, our two can also carry their own thicker Standard Bags, but then they are fairly large dogs and both have Large sized panniers… Please don’t order a Lighter Bag just for this reason though, if you do much camping in the depths of winter. I must emphasize that I do market these as a 3-season Bag.
(I must also reiterate here, that our dogs always wear PJs for sleeping in the tent, whichever bag they are using. They both have several jackets to choose from, ranging from a very light fleece to a thick synthetic fill duvet type jacket. These can even be layered in extreme conditions.)
If you are interested in a bag like this, please get in touch. The weight of these is obviously a bit lighter than the standard ones. A 27″ diameter combination bag weighs around 500g, a 25″ one about 480g and a 23″ about 435g. I have also made an Extra Large 30″ bag, which weighed around 650g. Price wise, I am charging £10 more for these bags, due to the lighter fabric being more expensive than the standard weight fabric.
The donor bags I use to make the sides of these lighter, 3-season Woof Bags, have a HUMAN lower temperature limit of 2C (compared to the standard 4-season ones which are -2C).
Lighter Woof Bags in action with our dogs:
Woof Bags 