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Tarps are fine in any temp, essentially all tents are is tarps stitched together. I spent MANY a night is 30-40 below or more in nothing but a tarp and ground sheet.
The key is insulate the ground under with spruce boughs at least foot or more thick.
On Bladeforums, there is a snow / winter shelter contest, and I've decided to
enter it to see how I do. The premise is that you can only use natural
materials, but I'm going to take a tarp just in case.
For the contest, I'll have to spend the night in the shelter.

The shelter is going to be underneath a low branch of a standing tree that has
been crossed by a fallen tree. The top end of the tree has broken over the
branch, and forms part of the back wall of the shelter.
I still have to fill in the left side of the back wall, which is what I'm going
to be doing this week.
[Linked Image from i292.photobucket.com]

There's a lot of long grass in the vicinity, so I'm going to use that for the
base. The grass is about 2-3 feet long, and I'm going to be making a thick
layer, probably about 6 to 10 inches deep.
[Linked Image from i292.photobucket.com]
[Linked Image from i292.photobucket.com]
This picture shows how I'm going to be laying the grass. The back part that I
still have to fill in is on the left
[Linked Image from i292.photobucket.com]

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String the tarp like a teepee with the centre strung up. Pin the sides down
tight and seal with snow or logs.
Condensation will form and freeze, not a big deal to scrape off in the morning.
Do you have a picture of how this is set up?

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You need a large tarp to do the teeppee style setup but the key is limit the
interior space to a minimum thus less airspace to heat up. A candle lantern
does well to keep the chill out.
I saw a candle lantern in the surplus store the other day. Was wondering if
if would be of any use. Looks like I'm going to have to go and pick one up,
or even better, as it's really close to Christmas, I'm going to drop a strong
hint to my brother...hehe...

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Keeping wind out 100% and ground insulation is the goal as it dont matter what
your bag rating if those 2 arent taken care of.
Hound

That's what I'm going to have the most problems with in this shelter I think.
It's quite windy where the setup is. The shelter faces north, and the valley
has strong west to east winds at this time of year. I'm going to have to stuff
a lot of grass in all the little nooks and crannies to make this work.

Thanks for the advice Hound!!!

Dawgs travel in packs; Don't mess with the pack JYD#62 Dave