Daisy said
"Assume the worst case - assume that you tent will get blown down in a rainstorm while you are gone."
*****************************
Daisy, why would a tent be "blown down" in a rain storm? You're not the kind of person that takes a free standing tent and fails to stake it are you?
Jim - just wondered as this has never happened to me. I agree remove food, but I've never even had a tent bothered by critters and I NEVER remove those "smelly things like toothpaste etc" or even my Hershey bar wrapper from my pack. I have had a 500 WILD pound bear come and check out my tent one morning, that I had all of my food in, and he just sniffed and lumbered off. I guess my smell offended him more than the food smelled good. It was very cold weather and I generally do not hang my food when its cold because it smells less. I find that when I am camped off trail in real wilderness that there are no animal visitors besides camp robber crows.