Originally Posted By: Snake_Doctor
Well said jac. My basic rule is this, 1000 rounds per gun, minimum, at all times. 5.56. 7.62, .45, .22 and a few others number in several thousands. Being able to buy wholesale, having connections for ammo and reloading all help with this. The simple fact is that if the world as we know it ends, there won't be anymore ammo to be had. It'll be hoarded like gold is now. Some ammo like 7.62x54 come in spam cans and it's just so easy to stack those neat cans which keeps the rounds fresh forever, that they just pile up. Literally. If it do's go bad we intend to just bug in, hold our own and live as much as we can off the livestock, crops, the fish and crawdeads and frogs from the ponds and stock tanks. No hunting, foraging scavenging for a few years. Hopefully it'll only be a year or two before things go back to normal and we wont have to defend what we have.


Not just EOTW but what about practicing. I'm not big on the 'buy a bunch of gear and stuff it in a box for 10 years then sell they rusty remains at a yard sale'. I make sure at least twice a year any of my gear gets pulled out and checked, cleaned, batteries replaced, used, tested, etc. with any gear purchase I budget in maintenance. Most of my gear uses AA batteries for example so maintenance cost is a few cents of electricity to recharge but anything that may take a special battery gets a replacement interval listed in my spreadsheet. I do that when I buy the gear and plan from there.

So I apply the same to guns, any that I might plan to use I practice amd train with. So say you decide your going to go to the range 4 times a year and shoot 100 rounds. I'll make my plan to have a minum of 400 target rounds in my ammo box at all times then in case I can't buy any (like now).

Now to give the author the benefit of the dought, maybe he's only listing defense ammo but his numbers still seem low even if thats it. It seems like the having 11 flashlights and only a few spare a batteries. or cans with no can opener. Or 'just add water' food with no addiitonal water.

If I haven't bored you yet I'll use mine as an example, I have two guns that I would consider my 'survival preps':

1. S&W M&P9c
2. Henry US Survival (AR-7)

Both of these now are part of my standard carry when I drive to 250 miles to the farm (BOL in this context).

So I list them in my gear maintenance spreadsheet with the following goals:

Practice: Pistol 4x annually, AR-7 2x annually.
For each buy one magazine annually.
Overall buy one box of ammo per month, this I rotate, maybe one box of 9mm this month, 22lr next month, 20 gauge the next.

The 20 gauge, .22 hornet and the marlin 60 (.22) I don't shoot regularly so they are on a clean 2x per year schedule. They are all youth size so they are mainly being saved for the kids when they get older.