Preppers: Is 10,000 Rounds Per Caliber Realistic?
Kevin Felts 09.17.18
Every once in awhile someone will post a comment in the forum or on one of my videos saying something along the lines of, “You should have at least 10,000 rounds per caliber.” A few days ago someone posted such a comment on my video about stockpiling ammunition.
While 10,000 rounds per caliber is a nice round number, is it feasible, or even realistic?
For the sake of discussion, please allow me to play Advocatus Diaboli (Devil’s Advocate).
If we exclude the AR-15, SKS and AK-47, chances are most of the people reading this article has one, or “maybe” two rifles in a certain caliber. Maybe it is a man thing. We walk into a gun store, or Pawn Shop, see a gun we like and buy it. Over the decades we end up with various rifles chambered in numerous calibers.
Let’s take four of my deer rifles – 30-30 Winchester, 270 Winchester, 280 Remington, and 308 Winchester.
If someone has a single lever action 30-30 Winchester, should they have 10,000 rounds stockpiled? Even with two lever action rifles, should the person have 10,000 rounds stockpiled?
Over the years, I have seen Remington Core-Lokt range in price from $13.95 – somewhere around $18 a box. While Remington Core-Lokt is not top of the line, a lot of people use it. Overall, Core-Lokt is very effective on deer sized game. Over the past 20+ years, I have numerous whitetail deer with Core-Lokt, so let’s use it as an example.
To make the math easy, let’s go with 16.00 for a box of 20 after tax. That equals out to 0.8 cents per round. Who reading this article has an extra $8,000 to stockpile 10,000 rounds of 30-30 Winchester in Remington Core-Lokt.
The next rifle is a Remington model 700 chambered in 280 Remington. Midway USA has Remington 140 Grain Core-Lokt Pointed Soft Point for $1.65 a round, or $32.99 for a box of 20. Are we cringing yet? To stockpile 10,000 rounds of 280 Remington in Core-Lokt, that would be $16,900.
Just for the 30-30 Winchester and 280 Remington we are up to $24,900, or your first born male child. It gets better as we are not done yet. We still need to add in the 270 Remington and 308 Winchester.
Academy Sport and Outdoors has a 20 round box of 270 Winchester in Remington Core-Lokt for $17.99. That equals 0.899 cents per round. Let’s multiple that by 10,000 rounds and we get a grand total of $8,995, tax not included.
For just three calibers we are up to $33,895, with tax only figured into one caliber. Texas has around an 8% sales tax, which equals out to $2,711.6 on $33,895.
We are over $35,000 for just three calibers, and we have not even figured in 223 / 5.56mm, 7.62×39, shotgun slugs and buckshot, 22 long rifle, 9mm, 45acp… etc.
Maybe that money would be better spent on a home or a retirement account?
My personal goal is around 1,000 rounds for hunting ammunition, and as much as I can get for 223 / 5.56mm and 7.62×39.
On average, how many rounds does the average hunter shoot in a year? Chances are less than 20. The average hunter will buy a box of ammo, shoot a couple of round to make sure their rife is sighted in, then go sit in a deer stand.
After a collapse of society, how many deer, squirrels, rabbits, or wild pigs could the average survivalist expect to harvest? Rather than spending thousands of dollars on ammo, why not buy a piece of land?
