Survival Rifles

This string topic is a bit too wide. This I know.

This string is absolutely NOT a "Best Survival Rifle" thread. There's no such thing. I have multiple tools in my tool-boxes / tool shed.

This is mainly about having a place to report on a rifle that you have purchased, would like to purchase, or a rifle you would like to write about due to its applicability to preparing for disaster situations or hunting.

A prepper primarily thinks about how they are going to put food on the table. Some prepper sites go on and on about "assault rifles" and defending one's fortress. Me, when I was a kid, firearms were about hunting. In high school, they were for target shooting / being on one's school rifle team. Battle rifles for me as a kid were about history / wars / soldiers in my family, i.e. something separate from the day to day. We already have threads concerning "assault rifles", air rifles / pellet rifles, and black powder rifles.

So, this thread should mainly be about handy-rifles and hunting rifles. Self-defense rifles I think should have a category of their own. Besides, handy rifles (truck gun) and hunting rifles can be put into service as home-defense weapons should the need arise. Sniper rifles had their origin in the hunting rifle. I sure wouldn't want to take-on a property-owner who is proficient in deer hunting!

Both rim-fire rifle and center-fire rifle topics should be covered, i.e. small game up to large game -- even dangerous game that might want to kill and eat us. People out West, up in Alaska, and those living in western Canada know what I'm talking about concerning BIG bears.

 

"The Best Hunting Rifles of 2023" by Outdor Life

https://www.outdoorlife.com/gear/best-hunting-rifles/

Begin quote:

Whether you hunt deer in the hardwoods, elk in the mountains, or bears in the Alaskan bush, there’s a hunting rifle for you. The landscape you plan to hunt, your hunting tactics, and the game you’re hunting will all play a role in the rifle you choose. But so will personal taste. Your rifle defines in part who you are as a hunter, whether it is a practical beater that lives in your truck for much of the year, a handy lever action, or a pricey long-range hammer. We’ve made that task a little easier by narrowing down the field to the best hunting rifles we’ve tested.

• Best Overall: Nosler 21
• Best Lever Action: Marlin 1895 SBL
• Best Value: CZ-USA 600 Alpha
• Best Long Range: Proof Tundra
• Most Versatile: Christensen Arms Ridgeline Scout
• Best Long-Range Varmint Rifle: Seekins Havak HIT
• Best Bear Rifle: Ruger Guide Gun
• Best Mountain Rifle: Weatherby Mark V Backcountry 2.0 TI Carbon
• Best Rimfire: Ruger 10/22 Competition
• Best Air Rifle: Air Venturi Avenger

End quote ---------------------------------------------------------

 

The "survival" gun is or needs to be based on what you intend to do and how long you are going to be in a survival situation. For me where I live and what my intentions are a Ruger 10-22 would be hard to beat. We don't have any big preditory animals that I would need a big gun to handle. If you might have to deal with a bear that would change things a lot. For a combo weapon that would do for hunting or defence I like the 5.56/.223. For a long time I shot a mini14 and honestly it was near perfection for my specific needs.

While I would like to have a shotgun, the ammo is just too heavy and expensive to reload in a mobile survival situation. I like the old basics mosty, lever actions and bolt actions will do anything that I need and not be wasteful of ammo. If you aim you only need one bullet to do the job and when all the ammo that you will have is what you can carry you need to be on the conservitive side.

There is something to be said for a 22 lr. Where I live it will handle all of the critters and in most cases the two legged animals too. I'm very fond of my Ruger 10-22. A good 5.56-.223 is also a good choice if you want a reloadable round. The biggest critter we have here is a relitivly small white tail deer. I went .357 mag for that level in a lever action. With 38 special reloads it is a fine small critter round and with hot 357 loads it will drop a deer out to nearly a 100 yards.

I'm pretty partial to lever actions for hunting. In East Texas we don't need something that will reach out to 300 yards. Most shots will be 100 yards or less in the woods. I have Lever actions in Savage, Winchester, and Marlin.

 

East Texas / East Tennessee (Western North Carolina) = whole lot of culture xfer. Davy Crockett's birthplace was around 20 miles (?) from where I was raised; his people lived down on the Nolichucky River. That valley is very fertile. My paternal kin are buried down there. Forested, no long-range shooting -- rare if you find it.

Now I do value shotguns in the "put food on the table" department. Pap (maternal, subsistence hunter, First People blood) taught me that. Paternal grandfather was way dangerous with a handgun -- even in the food on the table department.

I'm fond of the 20 ga. My dad's kin liked the 16 ga. Of course the 12 ga has its place, big time. Dead is dead. I don't want to destroy edible meat.

I've owned at least (?) three 10/22 rifles. Gave one to a son; he's subsequently bought himself another (a different configuration). I still have a bull-barrel, scoped, 10/22. ... and then there's the aperture (peep-sight) 10/22 that I can't account for . I must have traded it for whatever. Lord-lord, I used to do a LOT of trading. None of my sons remember me having given it to them . Oh well. Crap.

Man, I sure screwed-up trading my Anschutz. It was heavy for hunting (bull barrel) ... there's one of my "sour grapes" stories.

The lever .38 for critters = excellent choice. The standard velocity .38 Spec. semi-wadcutters are great -- can cast them yourself; they won't chain-fire in the tubular magazine. Back in the day (LONG ago), there were bunches of single-shot .32 rifles that were sold/used on small game. The .32 short kills just fine. My mom's dad (born before 1905) used his .32 cap'n'ball to put meat on the supper table.

"If you aim you only need one bullet to do the job and when all the ammo that you will have is what you can carry you need to be on the conservitive side." = soooooo true!
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I'm pretty fond of the old school 30-30 in part because the ammo for them is so common around here that you can find it in some of the country convience stores. I actually like the lever actions a lot and have several of them in 22lr, 30-30 and 300 savage. Where I live you just don't have to have a gun to shoot 300 yards or more. Other than pipe line right of ways most of the deer here are close enough that a shotgun would do the job. I have a Model 500 pump with a slug barrel on it that can shoot groups that I can cover with the plam of my hand out to nearly 100 yards. Off bags it can do a lot better but I don't hunt off sandbags and so don't waste my time shooting that way any more.

 

I like the 22 LR because where I live it will handle even the deer. In the event of a collapse I think that feral dogs will be a problem. When people stop feeding them they are going to start hunting again. Even the little dogs will be busy hunting and are as good as cats for rat control. There is a reason why some of them are called "Rat Terriers".

There were times when cats were seen as a bit troublesome and connected to witches in the minds of people. In the old cities rats were a major problem both for destroying food supplies and carrying diseases. Where cats were frowned upon the small dogs filled in to keep the rat populations down.

Most nondomestic animals don’t thrive when they are in contact with people BUT rats seem to be firmly attached to people and their cities. After the fall rats will be a big problem. If they are not controled they will destroy much of the food that people try to store and save.

 

I like the air rifles. They are great for practice shooting and as you mentioned they will also be handy for killing the small game animals and rats. Where I live we have all sorts of "rats". On more than one ocassion I have been asked by people that came here in the 70s when the auto industry crashed if we really have rats that are the size of a dog. LOL, the answer is oh HELL yes.

They are called neutra rats and are huge. Think of a rat a little over two feet long not counting the tail and 20+ pounds!!!! We hunt them and their fur is a selleable item. If you have never seen or heard of them though it is pretty shocking when you meet one up close and personal. They are not shy!!! They were imported with the hope that they would eat and thin out the Water Hyacinths. They didn't but they did like it here.

 

I like my bolt action CZ .22lr. It’s never far away from me while I’m at home.

 

Holy crap, I've never heard of that platform-type being chambered for the 22-250! You sure are right about it being a flat-shooting round. Can you buy barrels longer than 20" so as to get the most out of that chambering's velocity?

"... My reason is the 4 position adjustable gas selector, No problems shooting birdshot, buckshot or slugs. "

Now that is turbo smart!
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Here's a discussion concerning having a short 20" barrel for a 22-250 rifle:

https://www.predatormastersforums.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2754761

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I like .22lr bolt action but I would really like a folding combination gun like the Savage arms as well. The only thing that lets them down is that they’re impossible to silence. Shotguns are really versatile and 12g rounds are really common in the UK, a shotgun will always put meat on the table.
The 22-250 is an old favourite around here for muntjac and foxing, far better than the .223 but the rounds are more expensive and less common.

 

Chiappa Firearms M6

Expensive; over $700

https://www.chiappafirearms.com/family.php?id=35

"The Chiappa Firearms M6 folding survival gun is perfect for outdoorsman, ranchers, pilots or anyone who needs a portable, rugged and reliable rifle/shotgun combination. Based on the original M6, Chiappa’s improved version has updated features to meet the needs of today’s shooters and is available in 12ga/.22lr, 12ga/.22WMR, 20ga/.22lr or 20ga/.22WMR combinations. All new models have interchangeable choke tubes for maximum versatility. Barrels can be fired quickly and selectively, each having its own trigger...

 

Where I live a 22LR will do just about anything that we have here if you are food hunting and not sport hunting. My brother in law was a poacher and all he ever used was a 22LR. He killed hundreds of deer with that mostly because it makes less noise and attracts no attention in a rural area. As long as you have batteries why waste time hunting when you can just basically harvest deer at night. My point in this is that if you are hunting for food and there are no game laws that you don't need a lot of power. Deer are simple to kill at night with a spotlight! That is why it is illegal.

In a survival situation where you are hunting for FOOD you need to throw out most of the rules that a current hunter is ruled by. I also have a couple hundred feet of heavy stainless steel wire and with that you can snare almost anything. Attached to a smaller flexable tree it will hold and if made right, strangle a deer caught in it. As a side note, if you are on the move don't waste your time with large prey. Unless you have a bunch of people to feed it is hard to not waste a lot of meat if you kill a deer.

 

I fear there will be a great deal of waste when the power goes down which is a shame. Venison really does need to be cooked because of its parasite burden so is more suited to canning than it is to smoking or making into jerky. If any buddies manage to take a deer it usually gets shared out. Muntjac has no legal status in the UK but night shooting is still illegal.

 

One thing that is not really well known is that some of the most common and easily trapped wildlife is almost deadly if you try to live on it. You can eat a half dozen wild rabbits a day and still starve to DEATH. Animals like wild rabbits have almost no fat on them and lean meat isn't all that nourishing if you don't have other fat sources to go with them.

 

My kin used to eat groundhogs. They are greasy fat, especially in fall. Me, I think groundhog is way too gamey -- only eaten it once. My kin also used to eat bunches of tree nuts which are rich in oils. Eating fish is good for you. My mom's dad had been a subsistence hunter when young. He taught me to hunt and fish. For the people living up in the mountain hollers, this was anything but sport, this was about surviving winters. If we didn't get squirrels that day, then we'd dig ramps.
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In genersl if I don't eat it then I don't hunt it. I was always a fan of squirrels and rabbits. Deer are ok but lean as heck and have to be cooked right to be best. I'm more of a fisherman than a hunter and love fishing and eating them too. I was raised in an area with just endless oppertunity to fish both in fresh water and salt water. My favorite fishing place had both depending on the tides. When it went out the bass and catfish rushed in and then the redfish and flounder came in with the rising tide. This allowed me to bring home some pretty amazing and mixed catches. When you got a bite you never knew what you might bring in.

 

City-folk in the West are now utterly divorced from the natural world. Many are mightily neurotic.

By the by, here in the states, ranchers are often forced to use "come along" wenches to extract calves if the birth goes wrong.

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Switching back to the "Survival Rifle" topic, urbanites for the most part haven't a clue as how to use long-guns. They are utterly unable to effect aimed fire. What handguns they own, they don't know how to use. Ability to hunt game? What a joke!

The divide between urban and rural people has now become a vast chasm. We are talking separate cultures, separate nations.

 

Where I live there are several lakes and I live basically beside a river. LOL, it looks like a river and IS a river for all practical purposes but it is by law a lake because there is a dam and lake down the river from where I live and it is legally a lake for s certain distance up stream from the dam. That means that the fishing rules are based on the Lake rules and laws which are a little different from the river rules. ??? I nearly got in trouble over that but the Game warden let me off with a warning. I was fishing in a creek off the river about 30 or 40 miles up river from the dam. It was the lake !!! It was bull crap!!

 

Also back to the survival rifle topic...A "survival"rifle can be a lot of different things based on what sort of conditions and situations you will be having to deal with. Where I live if all it needs to do is feed you and offer a little protection a over and under might be hard to beat. A rifle on top and a shotgun on bottom covers a lot of needs. I also have and like an AR-7 22LR. With 25 round magazines it also can cover a lot of things.

East Texas doesn't really have any dangerouss critters so a 22 or 410 could be about all you need for small game food gathering. For the little bit of weight difference though I would prefer a 20 guage. The 3" mag slugs are a lot better than the 410 slugs for deer and the buch shot loads are a lot better thn the 410 for defence use. I wish they would make an over under with a 20 guage under a 22 Or maybe a 30-30 over a 20 guage.

I've always had a facination with seeking a one gun do it all weapon.

 

How bad is the feral hog problem in East Texas?

I was looking at a map of where the hogs are and it looked like every county in Texas had them.

In E.Texas, are the hogs being shot or trapped or both?

After just having read that entire sounders (packs; count can be over 30 hogs) have to be wiped-out in one fell swoop, one imagines that an AR-15 configuration would be needed when hunting. If pens are used, one could take their time slaughtering them, but an AR would get the job done more quickly.

The invasive hogs are destroying the native wildlife and farmer's fields. This is on a grand scale now. Plus, the entirety of the South seems now to be affected. It's wipe-out time and we need to get busy killing them off. Capturing sounders in big pens then shooting ALL of them in one fell swoop will be the only way to get this done.



Here's some videos of guys using AR-15s. Not to disparage these fellows, but they are scattering hogs more than slaughtering them. Even with semi-automatic fire, not enough hogs are being killed. Too, it would take people out there hunting ad perpetuum to kill off these monsters.




Even with fully-automatic fire, many hogs escape to breed:

 

I lean towards the over under guns because they allow you to handle basicly every hunting type situation with minimal use of ammo and best possible outcome. I can do most of the things that I need to do with a 22lr but the shotgun barrel is just a better choice in some cases. Buchshot and slugs will drop a deer better than a 22 would and are also better for defence.

We have a hog infestation!!! I've not had a problem but I know people that the hogs have torn their yards and gardens to shreds. I had a pack of them run me into a pond one time though. It is better now mostly because people that live in the country have started killing them on sight. You shoot them with a 22 and let them run off into the woods and die there.

I know that sounds cruel but dealing with a dead big hog in your yard is a mess. They aren't really fit to eat most of the year.

 

Here's a thought. re: Over-Under -note: I'm a pro-20ga bigot.

How about a .22 mag. over a 20 ga w/3" chamber? With birdshot, one could drop small game. 3" mag. buckshot would be for larger game and human aggressors. The .22 mag would be to reach out there -- has double the energy of the .22lr and is much flatter shooting. Having a 5.56NATO or 30-30 as the rifle barrel would allow even further reach -- especially the 5.56/.223.
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I'm not a big fan of the 22 mag. It seems to fall into a place where it is either too much or too little. For small game it isn't much better if any than a 22 LR and then for bigger things like deer and hogs it isn't quite enough to drop them with a body shot. For a do it all rifle I've always liked a 357. Where I live the deer are pretty small and you usually are pretty close to them in the woods. With a 38 special you can shoot light loads and take small game.

My survival setup would include a way to cast 38 bullets and a lot of primers. In a survival situation I could use the powder out of other rounds to reload. I KNOW that isn't recomended but in a survival situation I will be doing a lot of things that I normally would never do. I have a turret reloading press and a single stage press but I also have lee-loaders in my primary calibers.

Basically my go kits would be able to reload 38/357 and 30-30s. I reload 9mm but just hate having to hunt for the brass if I'm shooting in a place with grass. I would prefer the .357 because it allows you more latitude in your reloads. Automatics tend to work best with one specific pressure. Too much wears the gun excessivly and too little won't make it work dependably.

If you don't plan on reloading then you will need either a lot more ammo or be very careful about how many rounds you fire. When the last round is shot you are going to be in trouble. In the event of a disasterous collapse I will probably save my ammo for self-defence and do my hunting with projectile weapons that can be reused or replaced with things you can gather around your area. When I was a kid I made several bow and arrow sets. The first ones weren't too good but in later years they were actually pretty effective.

 

Ancient Chinese made their gunpowder using sulfur, charcoal, and pig waste products.

https://www.allthescience.org/can-you-really-make-gunpowder-from-urine.htm

"While you cannot literally make gunpowder from urine, as you need several other ingredients to produce it, urine can certainly be used to produce one necessary element. In addition to saltpeter, however, you would also need charcoal and sulfur. These ingredients are both readily available, unlike saltpeter, so the popular stories about using urine to make gunpowder do have a rational basis. Until World War I, before people learned to reliably synthetically produce niter, urine, guano, and manure were all collected to produce gunpowder.

"Initially, saltpeter was scraped from the walls of stables, but this source quickly proved to be insufficient, so people started collecting urine and dung to access the valuable nitrates. To extract saltpeter from urine historically, gunpowder manufacturers set up “niter beds” of straw, filtering the urine through the straw, which would concentrate the salts for easy collection. Urine has also had a number of other uses, and competition for available resources could sometimes be fierce, which may explain why many nations continued to use bladed weapons after the development of firearms, as making gunpowder was expensive and time consuming."
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Other means:

Ice packs -
https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Potassium-Nitrate

Just buy ammonium nitrate at a garden/farm supply house

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=making+potassium+nitrate+from+fertilizer

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sulfur

https://www.survival-manual.com/sulfur.php

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=where+to+obtain+sulfur&t=newext&atb=v320-1&iax=shopping&ia=shopping

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Making your own charcoal





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Recipes for black powder are all over the web. One needs to know how to mix ingredients with solvent and how to turn the dried-out product into powder. Be careful! By definition, this stuff goes BOOM! Grinding this product into powder can blind, cripple, and/or kill you. Metal container, tamping down with metal rod = sparks = death. Plastic containers have static electricity = fingers lost / death. Get my point!

Black-powder recipes:

https://www.scribd.com/document/281456692/Black-Powder-Recipes#

https://www.skylighter.com/blogs/how-to-make-fireworks/make-black-powder-quick-and-easy
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Because they don’t understand.. the Owens TV show about a Yorkshire farm showed skinning a dead lamb in order to get its mother to adopt an orphan lamb. An ancient practice that works wonders but not for the squeamish. These people think food grows on supermarket shelves.

 

Certainly the case in the UK where there is almost no natural wilderness, it is all managed to some degree and there is very little in the way of apex predation meaning that humans have to cull some animal populations as they get out of balance with the available resources. I’m sure the vegans will finally see it my way when the deer and bunnies have eaten all their soy crops.

 

Lie in wait for the hungry people to come, then wipe them out. Fewer mouths to feed. Carrying extra ammo is always a good thing. Too, if there are any cannibals in the area, you've provided them an easy supper -- meanwhile you get out'a that wretched area.

 

Guns are somewhat a matter of perspective. While in most of England and Europe personal possession of guns have not played a big part in history. Where I live just a few generations ago having guns and knowing how to use them was a matter of life and death. My Greatgrandfather made a comment one time to the efect that the only times that a man should not have a gun on was in bed with a woman, in church, and in his coffin.

Even now I am seldom without a gun near me. The only time that I have had to use it was on a pack of feral dogs that chased my daughter home on her bike one time. There were 6 of them and I killed 4 of them. The other two took off as soon as the shooting started. I never saw them again. Anywhere that I am going to spend a lot of time has a gun already there. It is not like I live in a place with much crime BUT survival is more about what you do before something happens than after. If yu have to hunt a gun amd ammo when something bad pops up you would be better off not having one and had just ran and hid.

 

"My Great-grandfather made a comment one time to the effect that the only times that a man should not have a gun on was in bed with a woman, in church, and in his coffin." -TexDanm

I d'know man! There's some decidedly dangerous women out there.

And, during these deeply insane times, some demonic psych-cases have been shooting-up Churches and Synagogues. In at least one attempted Church shooting, two parishioners took-on the nutcase, one of them shot the crazy demon. I hope that Jewish groups assign members to be armed guards at their religious ceremonies.

All of the violence that the mainstream media, video games, TV and movies spew tips marginal paranoid psychotics into clinical/dangerous psychotics. The Left wishes there to be high body-counts so that they might bring about their socialist agenda of civilian disarmament. They do not want the masses to be able to give any trouble to Big Brother. All must kneel before their false gods.
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There have been crazies shoting up churches several times in the past. There was one when I was about 20. I sat out in the parking lot during services with a Mini 14 a couple of times. Other men did it when it was their turn. It was pretty amazing what some of them came out with!! There were a couple of M1s and one tompson with a snail drum on it!!! Most though were deer rifles and shotguns. My Dad went with a side by side 12 ga with buckshot. In Texas almost everyone that doesn't live in one of the megalopolises has or carries a gun.

I keep a gun in my car here but when I go down into Houston I carry one. I have a concield carry permit. I'm not sure if you even need those now. Honestly, if you don't have a felony conviction there is no reason that you shouldn't have the right to keep and carry a firearm. I've probaly known a hundred people that carried a gun and not a single one of them has ever put a bullet in anyone. Showing a gun as often as not is all you have to do. I'm not talking about pulling it. I'm talking about just opening your coat or lifting your shirt.

I've been involved with guns for most of my adult life. I've bought and sold them. I've fixed and repaired them and even used to build a few. I've reloaded and fired tens of thousands of rounds. The thing about it is that you are only as good as the last 20 shots that you have made in the last couple of months. Serious survival shooting is all about muscle memory and that fades with time. I would be better than most but right now I would be a very disapointing shaddow of what I was, could, and should be.

 

I like pellet rifles for small game hunting in an area with limited sight distances. I have one that pushes around 1000 feet per second, That said, I would HATE to have to depend on one to protect my family. The only problem with it is that it is not quiet. When something exceeds the speed of sound it has a sharp crack sound. It is not real loud but it is loud enough to be heard a couple hundred yards away on a quiet day. It is great for squirrels, rabbits. and birds.

 

As with tornado damage in rural areas, who knows who is going to get hit by invaders.

Here in the States, rural areas are getting slammed with society's ills. American ranchers who live on the border with Mexico are getting hit hard by the thieves in amongst the waves of illegal aliens. Tiny towns in America's Heartland are experiencing homicides due to the illegal drug trade. In my tiny-town, there was a home invasion less than a quarter mile away from our home. Minority neighbors are perpetually screaming at each other in their front yards. I don't even know who is living in one such house after the grandfather/great-grandfather has been sent to prison (for a second time). It is not rare to hear gunfire at night. And oh by the way, this place is very civilized otherwise. I just have to be ready should their uncivilized behaviors spill-over onto my turf.

When it hits the fan, I REALLY have to be ready to defend this place with gunfire if necessary. Hopefully, we can get back to my home state. These insane real-estate prices and elevating interest rates are jamming-up our plans to do so.

I've been further surrounding my house with night lights. So far the known invaders have been groundhogs. They are digging under my shed out back. I'm getting soft like my maternal grandfather. After decades of eating squirrels, he started feeding them. I could trap these groundhogs, but haven't -- they're cute. I do have one "tender-trap" -- could use that. I've gone soft.


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