Only One Gun in a Survival Situation

I would recommend that you learn to disassemble and clean it too. A dirty semi-auto will jam often and be a pain for hunting, never mind self defense.

i completely agree!!!

my 10/22 was purchased as Dunham’s for $210 including tax. just bought a grip of magazines with that gearhog deal for brownell’s. they had boxes of 525 .22lr for $16.

with an ar or ak, you can sure put a lot of lead downrange, but it’s going to cost you at a time when resupply may be out of the question.

I love my ruger 10/22. Was a standard carbine. Added a ATI folding stock and a truglow red dot sight.

Also, for a BOB you can’t beat a Henry AR-7, US survival rifle.

No arguement, there! A family member of mine, who worked for the Forestry Dept.years ago, had to kill an elk during a survival situation in the deep backcountry. It took one lung shot. He put a baby bottle nipple over the muzle to quiet the shot, then the elk, thinking it was just a bite of a horsefly, probably, died after a brief wait.

The 10/22 is a fine weapon. I vied for the Marlin model 60 with 14 round tube magazine. A little less expensive, $160, and no protruding clip. Not as quick to reload though so I made up some 14 round copper tubes. Can reload the mag in under 10 seconds. Staying quiet while taking game means someone won’t be trying to take it from you!

Agree. You will typically see a ton of small game in the woods, compared to a very small chance of seeing a deer on any given day. Plus a .22 is nice and quiet, way safer to keep quiet and not attract attention for miles around like you will with a 30-06.

OK, Now for your crapstorm of criticism: You have mentioned the perfect gun. I can almost see the shares in Sturm Ruger going up as I write this.

As a college student, I used to compete in small-bore competition simply because it was the most affordable by far to shoot and practice with frequently. I also have many fond memories of hunting squirrels in the trees on a sunny but cold fall days. If you cannot shoot a 22 rimfire well then you will have trouble shooting any other caliber well. Master the rimfire and those skills transfer over to other weapons. (with exceptions of shotguns)

I used to compete in both rifle and pistol so I have both rifles and pistols in 22 long rifle. The one gun I have used to put more meat on the table with and has killed more critters is my Ruger single six revolver. I won turkey shoots in the pistol catagory in the fall. Ham shoots in the spring. I shot 172 skunks with it before I stopped counting. (I shot skunks from 15-20 yards away so I did not get sprayed)

Another gret post.

Been prepping for quite sometime. Have all the big bores up to .50 cal, however, the very first weapon purchased for myself and each of my children, and now grandchildren is the reliable .22. The ability to use it plain, or fix it so that it looks like some space weapon is up to the imagination. Bottom line is that in the crunch, a .22 (you pick the maker),in the hands of someone that has practised and knows their weapon will be an extremely useful tool for survival.

Love it. I have to add my name to the list of those in agreement. Love the folding stock option on the recently released 10/22. Thanks night owl.

To Night Owl: No crapload of criticism from me. I agree. It is the perfect choice.

Has anyone shot the new 10-22 take down model? I saw an advertisement for one but do not know anyone with one?

i would add a 8$ bipod for stability as i have shaky hands and i found my accuracy which was pretty good got better and stayed that way(knock on wood) very good choice of weapon

I own four ruger 10/22 models. The SR22 rifle is dead on with a nice scope.
I am a big fan of ruger and there guns are made in america. I also own two 9MM Ruger pistols. Shoot a lot, never had any problems.
GOOD LUCK

In a SHTF situation, I wouldn’t worry about violating game laws. Game wardens and other law enforcement personnel will have a much higher priority and that will be civil law enforcement. At the very least, they would not be enforcing game laws and might even encourage you to do whatever it takes to feed your family. This being the case, jacklighting and baiting deer would be the order of the day.

Back in my youth days, I had a Winchester single shot bolt action 22 rifle. In the mid 1950’s, we had tough times because of job losses in Oregon. My dad and I would go deer hunting to put food on the table. I was a darn good shot with that 22 and I always made my shots count. I had no problem taking down the coastal deer with a head shot. Some my shots had to be be from behind,so I took a spine shot. Although that didnt kill the deer, my second shot did.

So, in all due respect, if you have the patience, you can kill many deer with a 22. Im just sorry that I didnt have a 1022 in those days, that would have really made my day. Oh by the way, most of my shots were an average of 30 to 40 yards.

Well, you probably already know, but I like that .22 caliber. Doesn’t matter what kind of weapon you shoot it with. I personally have a liken to a CB.22 short. Has no powder, takes small game and varmints without the neighbors getting all riled up. Nobody hears a thing! Believe me, I tried it.

If a person was needing food, just the silhouette of a rifle in your hand will get some people upset. So, by using shadows, landscaping, & building structures, game can be gotten in small communities. Also, wait till the neighbors go out for evening, then the field is all yours. Oh, that scope helps when you wear bifocals.

I have no doubt in my mind that in a situation of complete collapse I would want to keep close by my .22 rifle, .22 handgun and 12 gauge shot gun. If I had to pack and move quickly I would definitely take at least my .22 handgun and as much ammo as I could carry. If I had more room or carrying capacity I would next throw in my .22 rifle. I would only have to worry about carrying one kind of ammo, light weight and versatile. Keep in mind, in a true bug out situation. water and food would be more important to load up on. My .22 handgun and ammo wouldn’t take up as much space. A well made solid knife is also a must.

Good day all In my youger days I have killed several Pa bucks avg weight 175 + Lbs with a 22cal placed shot wright in the ear and it did not run far at all.

Now the more powerful 22 wmr will knock a deer right down with a well placed neck / head shot. Buck or Doe.

I have a 10/22 and it would be my choice as well. However, I’d want a small bolt action option for CB shorts, etc. and dead nuts reliability for food gathering in a long term situation. Given that, I’m also thiking of adding one of the new Savage Cadet youth rifles as a pack gun. Most likely the Green/Olive Drab version.

For me the best all rounder, for a gun in survival world. Big bore PCP with rifle and good scope plus hand pump, like poss the Sam yung 909s big bore. Ammo easy to carry, .45 cal big bore will take almost anything out up to around 3 to 400 yards, real big stuff up to 70 yards. Less noise, less weight too.

Any semi-auto in a survival situation is not preferable.jamming,parts breaking due to extreme cold,the bolt parts expanding then contracting also due to the temps.

The best would be a breakaction..410,20G,3030,iron sights,if your scope breaks,falls off gets lost etc.and you have no iron sights then your stuck.Stock cuff to hold extra rounds,a robust leather sling and maybe a tac light.don’t forget the cleaning as well, a bore snake, solvent and clean cloths,oil.

Breakaction single shots will last longer then most of those would who use them.

And they ARE the most accurate.simple to use and clean,not much to break,light,

just my .02$

.22 ammo is the most basic prepping round.

Got a 10/22 with over/under sights,
AR15 with a .22 conversion kit & over/under sights
Glock 40cal with 9mm and .22 conversion kits

Plus Old faithfull mossy 590A1

I have other as well, but if I could only take 1 it would be the AR with the .22 Conversion. I get the reliability of bolt actions, but a multi caliber rifle wins hands down.

A hit w/22 is better than a miss from a large cal. Cheaper to practice with! This is important, practice, practice, practice! If you own a lever, bolt, pump or revolver you can interchange 22 cal ammo. It was a great post. Thank you. Carl

In any survival situation,unless you have logistics high tech in a primary or backup weapon is i believe not preferable.With all that people will b carrying the last thing you need is something to break, fall off, or jam up.single shots(savages new over/under),H&R,TC,s with extra barrels,.Side arm chambered for the same as the long rifle,revolver.

Have two 10/22’s,great rifles,never had a misfire,have had failure to feeddue to worn out 30 round mag.Any .22 lr ammo goes through them no problem.At this time,here in Mississippi .22lr can’t be found except at gun shows and it is 60.00 and above for a brick of 500 rounds,hope this ends soon.Just glad I got my15,000 rounds put back.Found some Tula .223 at the Wal-Mart in D’iberville,Ms. The other night they limit to 3 boxes,mix or match,or all of one type.I guess DHS has got the market on ammo,just like the leftist socialist president wanted.Wish this country had a recall on presidents,he would be run out of office.

I have .22’s as my “round of choice”
I have a Henry Ar-7, a BLR-22 and a Heritage revolver.

For the more “settled” situation, I would fall back onto my 30-30 and 12 g

I rely on the .22lr. I have had a .22 rossi rifle for about 25 yrs (only long gun I own) and killed many critters with ot. Also have a firestorm 10rd .22lr. i love this pair.

have a powerful .22 airgun (TF contender 89) and weaker but acurate .177 airgun (Xisico B12-6, same as Stoeger X5) for small game hunting (i kill pigeons at 10/15yds with the less expensive and weaker airgun). Like to have both calibers, as buying pellets may be a concern. Have decent stock of both pellets, but who knows? .22 solid pellets are easier to cast, in a pinch.

Going to add: .380 pistol or .38spl revolver; 12ga SxS shotgun (pumps are more expensive here and single barrels are just a lil cheaper than the double); .177 air pistol, maybe a crosman 1377 or beeman p17, for handgun training purposes, since one can’t just go outside and shoot a firearm.

this setup is the best I can think of, as i live in a gun restrictive country, we need lots of paperwork/taxes/fees, and .380/.38spl are the most powerful civilian handgun caliber allowed; .44-40 is the best rifle, but ammo is painfully expensive (10x more than .22lr, which is not exactly cheap here).

The biggest game we have here are about whitetail sized deer, jaguars and cougars, alligators, boars, tapirs, feral water buffalo and cattle (know many guys who took them decently with 2 12ga slug shots). More common small/medium game are pecaris/javelina, capybara, small deer species (much like african duiker). Small game as follow: foxes, rabbits, hares, cavies, possums, squirrels, nutrias, lots of edible birds up to turkey size, ducks and such.

having a chamber reductor here makes sense in survival, since you may get free/black market ammo for guns you don’t own, but may shoot through a break-barrel shotgun.

If i lived in the US/Canada maybe? I’d have a bolt action .308 rifle for general purpose hunting/sniping; the great 10/22, .45acp paraord 14-45, a mossberg 590 12ga, a 9mm/.380 small pistol for HD/SD. I’d throw in a singlebarrel 12ga shotgun and my beloved .22 firestorm.

That would cover a wide range of applications, i guess.

Ah, the very shotgun i’d like to buy is this stoeger SxS, but “standard”, no defense stuff and double triggers, which i like most.

nice article.

Depends what you mean by a survival situation. If you thinking like me very long term SHTF time then the whole game plan changes completely. In this scenario if your are thinking semi automatic or large caliber you are not thinking. Semi automatics are complicated and prone to failure. Maybe not in a year or two. But what about 3 years or 4 years? Do you risk it? For an all rounder you should be thinking a good bolt action. Ammunition weighs a lot to. I can carry a few hundred rounds of 22LR (even 22wmr) without too much bother. Try that with a 30/30 or 223 or 308. Good luck with that one. 22lr may not be the ultimate man stopper but it’s accurate, low recoil, easy to sound suppress and will kill an attacker if hit in any vital regions. Sound suppression is critical. If you go blasting away with your 308 in the woods it’s likely that you may not have that 308 in the morning. Always a good idea to go with military calibers where applicable (22LR aside) for I hope obvious reasons. Remember in a serious long term survival situation it’s likely that the survivors are intelligent. (Unlike our current short lived society, stupidity is not rewarded in the real world.) If there are no Doctors around a scratch can mean death. Getting shot with a 22Lr pretty much anywhere is a certain death without Doctors around. The “enemy” will probably know that and think twice before messing with you. Depending on where you are and the situation you may need to be on the move. If it’s SHTF time fuel won’t last long. So unless you are in your bunker already and far from people mobility is critical to survival. etc. etc.

Finally Hollow points are a gimmick on a 22LR. Go FMJ solids only. 22LR kill by having good penetration and just enough velocity to bouncing around inside you penetrating vital organs. Nothing to to with gimmicky hollow points. The bullet travels too slowly for the hollow point to make any difference.

I lived in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) during the war. I’ll never forget a story in the national paper. Two teenage boys on a farm armed with 22LRs held off a group of terrorists armed with AK 47s, and survived. Of course it’s not the best man stopper but think about weight and availability and food. It ticks most of the boxes. When bullets are flying in your direction you not really thinking about what caliber they are! For a test though. pack a 1000 rounds of 30 06 in your backpack grab your rifle and walk 10 miles. I’ll do the same with my lightweight 22LR. In a survival situation on the move you will only have one gun.

Absolutely agree with this article. We invested in a couple 10/22’s with scopes and have steadily been collecting ammo, which is of course hard to find, but can be if you do a little digging and learn when stores get their ammo shipments. I just picked up 1,400 rounds last night at Dunhams, but the rest of the .22 ammo was gone literally before the employee put it on the shelf.

The 10/22 is the single most useful gun ever made. While I’ve never attempted big game, due to laws in my state regulating caliber, I’ve killed several hogs at 100+ yards, as well as innumerable nuisance animals. If I can immediately drop a hog a well placed shot can take a deer (though I would also admit shooting a deer with a .22 in a non-survival situation is cruel, due to increased chance of injuring an animal that ultimately gets away). On many occasions I’ve hunted my dinner when the wife was away (dove, rabbit, squirrel, pheasant, etc).

As for home defense, a neighbor chased of two home invaders with a Marlin 60 several years back. They didn’t stop to check caliber when he touch off a few rounds (btw, AFTER he had warned them he had a gun and they broke through his door anyway. Though he missed them, the gun shots made them turn and run). Imagine how much better the scenario would have been with a 10/22 and a 25 round clip. It’s no shotgun, but in a one-gun scenario it can’t be beat.

Update: It’s been months since we’ve been able to find virtually any .22LR ammo. Might want to reconsider your choices.

This article should have been updated for 2014 before reposting it. at least here on the west coast .22 is almost impossible to buy. it is no longer the most common or widely found ammo. if you do happen to find some its likely to cost 3 to 4 times its “normal” price. i’ve seen stores selling a 500 round box of Remington for $92. Walmart has green tip .223 for $199 for 420 rnds and 500 rnd can of steel case tulammo for $149 making .223 a far better deal all around. while the .22 is almost non existent out here, ive found .223 for sale just about anywhere. and with the giant boom of the ar 15, the options for set ups are incredible. dont get me wrong, i love my 10/22. its a great gun. i just cant shoot it if i cant get ammo.

I think in a “one gun” survival situation, I’m going to go with my old single shot .410. When things are so bad that you have to go walking into the hills to feed your family, odds are you have a crapload of other things to take care of at home, which are just as necessary to complete daily. So with a small shotgun you’re going to miss less. I live in deer hunting country, and I still wouldn’t bother focusing on them. There is always WAY more small game to be had, and mostly birds, and hitting a small bird in flight with a .22 is not too easy, beyond my skill for sure. I think with a small shotgun, I would finish my hunting duties sooner, leaving time for other chores, like fetching water, firewood, etc.

I disagree that the .22 is the go to weapon in a survival situation. My choice is a Russian or Yugoslavian AK 47. The 22 will be useless since most games will be depleted. The 22 will jam under adverse conditions but AK will not. Yes, you can carry more ammo if you can find some. I believe that the 22 has been parroted by many, especially by survival blogger, that it is almost gospel truth.

Ran across some sub-sonic 22 lr hp last week ( limit of 4 boxes @ $6 each ). Yeah, I know pretty spendy, but I popped for it ( did manage to snag 600 rds ). The other option was Remington Ely super match at $15 for box of 50. Other than that,pretty sparse.

the Ruger is the only rifle i own…..great gun. But for just 1 Gun i would take my H&R single shot 20Ga. Shot shell for small game. buckshot for HD….Slugs for deer hunting. With practice I can reload and shoot a second buckshot in 3.5 seconds. Of course i also would have my S&W 1911 on me for HD. But the Ruger would be a close second choice.

I remember on the High Road forum, someone was taking a 10/22 to Peru and wanted to know what spare parts to take since there are no Ruger dealers in Peru. EVERYONE said take none! it doesn’t need spare parts! What an endorsement coming from those forumites.

Ill stick with my LWRC REPR in 7.62×51
22 is ok but i would rather be able to take stuff out at 500 yds or so and make sure it stays down!

I have not found any ammo for sale in 2 years. My .22’s are sitting. I live in a big city.

I don’t necessarily agree that the 22 would be the BEST survival gun. In my personal opinion I would go with a 12 gauge. Except for the weight of ammo I think it beats the 22 in all other area’s. It will kill large game better. It will stop a man better. I can take birds in the air hunting with it and I know I’m not good enough with a 22 for that. Don’t get me wrong I have a Marlin 60 a 10/22 an HR 9 shot revolver an MK2 and a bolt action single shot that is so old I can’t even remember who made it so I AM a fan of the 22 cal but if I had to pick one it would be the gauge.

Have fun hunting squirrels and pissing off big fat guys for trying to shoot them with that caliber. He’ll walk up to you and beat you with it before he even dies.

Savage model 24, 22 mag top. W/20 gauge bottom. I love this gun’ I am looking for 1 w 22 LR on top then all bases will be covered

Recently added a scope, bipod, extension recoil pad and flash hider. my 10/22. Now it won’t fit in a standard rifle case.
It now measures 40 inches with the additions. It no longer fits in the load gun case. Any suggestions about another case soft or hard would be appreciated. Thanks.

I agree with others, .22 is gone from the stores, easier to get 5.56, and a carbon receiver AR rifle can weigh 4.9 lbs.
but if you have a good stock of .22 already, sure,.22 is fine for a short term “get back home” survival situation,

but always remember this:

History has been most unkind to refugees.

So , FIRST, if one’s survival plan is to become a nomad wandering the land like “The Road,” Book of Eli” or Mad Max, then:
The choice of firearm is not the question, its the overall survival plan that should be questioned.

2,000 calories per day per person in your group.
most fruit is about 350 calories PER POUND
deer meat is 700 per pound.
got a wife and child?, that 6,000 calories per day, every day.
The Cherokee could follow the Bison herds as nomads because there were literally a million of them and each one weighed over 800 lbs.
In the WWII battle for Leningrad, the Russians ate all the local birds then rats, then they started to cannibalize their own dead.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannibalism#World_War_II

its hard for people to come to terms with the reality of 2,000kcal per day per person. do the math, you’ll be planting a garden and learning about nut trees, Hint, walnuts, 3,400 calories per pound
Hazel nuts 2,500 kcal per lb, takes 5 years for the tree to mature, 20lbs of nuts per tree.
How many nut trees do you need to meet just 1/3 the caloric needs of a family of 3?
So
forget worrying which .22 gun is best, better own land for 5 years and plant an orchard.
fence it and have some means to really defend it.

Actually, it’s more like 4000-5000 calories per day, due to stress, cold weather, etc. Cherokee did not follow bison herds. Sioux-Lakota-Cheyenne-Arapaho did that. Bison weigh as much as a ton. 800 lb one would be a yearling calf. Only have of an animals’ live weight is edible meat. You have to get about half of your diet from plants, or you’ll get sick, and it’s much easier to source food that way, anyhow.

traps, snares, nets, birdlime, poison (mostly for fish) trotlines, all are far more efficient ways to get fleshfood than hunting. all you really do, actually, is keep your (silenced) autorifle handy and your senses alert asyou tend your traps and nets. Set them up 1 4 circuits, like a 4 leaf clover, so that you end up back at “base camp” quite often, so that you need not carry your catch very far. Naturally, gut and clean it while away from camp, to avoid the mess there attracting flies, but use the guts as bait for traps/fishing. Nets can be turned into temporary “holding pens” for fish. that helps a lot, if you’re not ready to cure their flesh.

you do NOT have to settle for JUST a.22 rifle. Ciener firearms makes $200 (30 rd box mags) conversion unit .22’s, for AK’s, AR’s, Mini-14’s. So you can have BOTH a centerfire and .22, with a 20 second parts swap. accuracy is 2″ groups or better at 50 yds, which is plenty good enough for foraging. Put a silencer on your take down 223 autorifle, and use the subsonic 60 gr Aquila .22 ammo. It sounds like a BB gun thru the 223 “can”. 223’s sound like a regular .22, and have no flash at night (if the can is any good). plenty of YouTube videos about the .22 units and silencers. Use 60 gr Nosler Partition softpoints and the shorty 223 will be just as effective as the 30-30 ever was.

your rifle should be concealable, at least, when taken down and put into a pack. You might want to cross a bridge, enter a town, hitch a ride, ride a bike or horse or boat without being obviously armed. The AR takes down in 5 seconds (push 2 retained pins) and reassembles to fire in 10 seconds. You want a set of luminous iron sights, a see thru scope mount “tunnel”, a 2×7 compact scope, and a forend mount for the military M16 bipod.

I’d not be without a 16 oz 9mm in my front pants pocket holster, either. It’s my EDC gun, so why discard it if shtf, hmm? :-) pocket rig is out of sight, out of the weather and debris, out of the way of the backpack and the rifle, yet accessible. Perfect, actually. I’d only carry one spare mag and ammo to fill both mags. There’s little use for a pistol when everyone is carrying a rifle. so keep it very lw and compact. Kahr’s CM9 ($50, 15 oz) is a great choice. Keltec’s $350) PF9 (13 ozs) has a .22lr unit available,(10 ozs, $250) from Twisted Industries. TI also offers a longer, threaded barrel for silencing their .22 unit. Tjat barrel is $70.

This has nothing to do with guns but it DOES have to do with survival in a SHTF fan situation…INFECTION!

In the civil war the death rate among both sides was tremendous. But it was not entirely due to wounds directly, it was from INFECTED wounds. Back in those days in the old west even a cut hand from barbed wire or a cat scratch was a death sentence if it infected.

I have had surgeries (major) in my time. I save leftover meds!!! I have bottles of antibiotics. I have many narcotic pain killers, (all LEGAL that were prescribed to me) I have many, many tubes of over the counter wound creams that CONTAIN ANTIBIOTICS in my SHTF kit. I have lots of high blood pressure meds saved.

Meds, ESPECIALLY ANTIBIOTICS, will NOT be available when/if SHTF! Do you really want to die from a cut hand while opening a can of beans? My advice? Start saving meds (legally) wherever you can.

I agree with you 100%. I do because I have killed a lot of things with mine. It is quite, mobile, accurate, and reliable. It was my first rifle and the best one I’ve shot. I’ve got a 25 round magazine and it’s never jamed once.

In a long term situation (like the wheels have really come off) I reckon toothpaste is the key to long term survival. No point getting game if you can’t eat it. I’m with Tom Smith. (but have a 22 bolt action as well)

Sorry, but I go with the HENRY H001 LEVER rifle. 5.25 lbs,lightweight/maneauverable,accurate,tube fed. ULTRA RELIABLE, ULTRA EASY OPERATION, EASY MAINTANENCE/BASIC CLEANING. Takes 15LR down to 22SHORTS. Eats EVERYTHING including bulk 22. No jams or misfires. No “dirt magnet” like a semi-auto. And as an aside, I have Ruger SP101 22lr REVOLVER 8 shot cylinder, 4.2″ barrel at about 29 ozs – built like a tank…..with ALL the important attributes of the HENRY Rifle listed above. I’ll take the HIGHEST % RELIABILITY I can get in a “survival” situation – EXTRA-ESPECIALLY WHEN TALKING ABOUT 22 AMMO/FIREARMS !!!!!!

You don’t need to do so much apologizing! I have dropped many deer with one good shot from a .22 at a range of up to 75 yards. I don’t recommend a long shot but if you’re within 100 feet and know how to shoot its perfectly humane. Drop ’em in their tracks. Build a fire! Let’s eat.

I agree with the choice of the .22LR but further analyzing the capabilities of the gun and the demands of SHTF this can be even further refined. To this:

The S&W 22A Target Pistol. With a mounted scope.

Now you’ve got a .22 that (almost) fits in your pocket, and has just about the same accuracy as a Ruger 10/22. And it costs about the same and it has a 10 round magazine too. It weighs like 3 pounds and it doesnt need to be slung, you can put it in a bag.

It doesnt have stock support so you’d have to be sure of your shot (that is, hold your hands real dam steady). But you would have a cheap 3-6x scope on it so you’d have magnification and you’d have crosshairs and you would know how much the bullet drops to mark it off accordingly.

The .22 ammunition fired from the pistol is going to remain about as accurate as it is out of the rifle, for the distances involved that a .22 is used to take small game with. There is a reason that pistols like these are used in close range competition type shooting.

The Ruger 10/22 might beat it by about 25 yards, but I hardly call a 50 yard shot against a Bunny much different than a 75 yard shot against one. It would be harder to shoot a deer in the eyeball with it but I think the benefits of the pistol outweigh these concerns.

(consequently the ballistic accuracy of a .22LR at best is only about 70 yards, ive seen this figure quoted before. I can testify to this because I used my father’s Ruger 10/22 to shoot the tops of bowling pins at 100 yards at the local range. Even though I knew how high to adjust for they only hit the top about 50% of the time, and my aim was precise, because at 50 yards I was hitting a 1″ group)

As an Aside … in giving advice to others for SHTF ive read some reviews about 9mm Subsonic (147gr) ammunition being usable for taking small game. The heavier bullet moves slower, and the reduced velocity downrange causes less damage to the critter and you dont lose much meat (they dont go splat like they do with a high velocity hollowpoint).

So if you have a 9mm Pistol that you can mount a Scope on you can actually use that for taking small game or even something like a deer. But in that case you should always go for headshots even on small game if you have the chance.

And yet another suggestion ive heard talk of … there is a chamber adapter for .308 bolt action rifles that allows you to fire a simple .32acp round (I guess .32 will shoot through a .308 barrel otherwise they wouldnt make it). The .32acp will hit abouot like a .22 and wont damage the structure of the target.

It really depends on where you are, and how much money you’ve got to spend but the most efficient combination ive discovered for SHTF is:

** S&W 22A Target Pistol, for hunting small game.
** Taurus .44 Magnum revolver, with 8″ Barrel, processed for Speed Strips.
** Derringer double barrel, in 9x19mm or .38 Special, with a 3.5″ barrel (very important).

The magnum is so powerful it can stand in for a shotgun in takedown power (yes I just said it replaces a shotgun, so sue me) but it can be used easily at punching and kicking range (panic/hip shooting use). Using speed strips lets it be reloaded at a comparable speed to a semi-automatic. And I believe it can have a scope mounted on it too, so you could hit up to 100 yards reliably with it.

The reason I choose that over a .357 is because it destroys property better (doorhandles, body armor) and it does have an extra oomph over .357.

If anything id set that as the primary, but you’re not going to be taking any small game with it no matter what kind of ammunition you use (even the super light high velocity ammunition).

The Derringer of course is a “surprise!” gun, a backup weapon in case you’re being attacked or robbed. But I was specific with saying it should have the long barrel and not be a .357 (which is twice as expensive), because in the longer barrel the shorter rounds will get more velocity and parallel the .357 out of a tiny 2″ barrel. For a weapon that you may never even use, and when you did 2 shots would probably be adequate, its probably about as good as a 5-7 shot autoloader.

But this is a One-Gun thread.
And my choice, from what ive seen, if you’re going to include going after small game is …

** Masterpiece Arms (Uzi) in 9mm, Side Cock with Scope Mount, and threaded barrel.

Why?
> 9mm caliber is common and pretty cheap.
> The barrel extension (~6″) cooks it up to a better velocity than usual.
> Scoped
> 30-35 round magazines means you wont be shedding any tears if you have to go through 20 all at once in an emergency. And as a general rule you can do a Triple Tap as a reaction for self defense without even thinking (im not talking about full auto here at all, just rapid fire semi auto).
> 9mm Subsonic, combined with taking off the barrel extension, and you can hunt small game.
> Uzi looks intimidating and seeing a long magazine sticking out of the bottom suggests to people that you have “more than enough to go around”.

The rule is as simple as it is irrefutable.
“He who gets there firstist with the mostist, wins.” Period. I’ll take the 22.

Bought a S&W M&P 22lr compact. I have put quite a few rounds through it so far of variable kinds of ammo and am very, very impressed with the reliability and accuracy so far. I would trust that this gun would be a primary option for a defense gun if necessary.

ruger charger 22 compact shoots like a rifle uses 10-22 accs.

Difficult choice of only one firearm, so I’ll have to go with gut feeling. Ruger 10-22 Take-Down with Tech-Sights. No scope. This choice is based on my personal shooting experience with both a standard 10-22, a take-down 10-22, a myriad of other rifles and shotguns, and small and large game hunting. There are specific reasons why I want a take-down over a standard rifle, why I want Tech-Sights and why I don’t want a scope. But most important are the specific tactics to be employed with this rifle, both for food gathering and personal defense. If these tactics are not followed, the 10-22 take-down is a bad choice. But if they are employed, the 10-22 take-down is probably the best compromise firearm (for me anyway) to be used in a bad situation, aka “SHTF”. In SHTF, the devil is definitely in the details both in selection and use of a single weapon.

Good article but you lost me at recommending a semi automatic as a survival weapon? There is no debate. A good Mauser based bolt action is the only way to go. Too much can go wrong with a semi auto and the action is no where near as strong as a bolt. (Single shot rifle would be ideal except survival often means defending yourself)

I’d tend to lead towards the .22 auto rifle, and making sure to keep it as clean as practical. If the stuff really hits the fan, and you need a larger bored weapon, there should be targets of opportunity.

i were fan of W/20 gauge bottom. I love this gun I am looking for 1 w 22 LR on top then all bases will be covered.

Being Fan of short rifle,I still prefer to get long rifle referring your article. But still there are certain points i want to clarify for long rifle that weight would be similar, range of shooting must higher and these long rifles should be hold most bullets

Large game like deer that an AK round would be good for, those will be depleted first. Rabbits, squirrels, for which AK round will be overkill and .22LR is the right round, those will still be around, and will repopulated quickly as r-strategists.

A lot depends on where you live. We are in the city. Learning to trap rats and pigeons is first order. A single or double barreled 12 gauge and a bicycle may be best. How much defense needed versus availability of game forces the choice.

I think the coyotes and mongrels will have the advantage.

Good thread, mostly. Have 10/22 takedown, 2 Mosins (one stock with bayonet and open sights, one modded with Timney trigger, Bushnell Banner dusk/dawn scope, Boyd’s stock, etc.), Stevens 410/22 crack barrel, Rossi pump .22 saddle gun, Win and Ithaca pump action 12s and 20s with a variety of chokes, Rem700 22 – 250 and 222.

Of what I have the 10/22 is my go-to gun but if I had to do it all over again I’d get the Ruger American .22. The add-ons I’ve gotten for the takedown are bulky enough that it makes more sense to have an assembled gun ready on a sling than an assortment of parts packed away in a duffel bag. Plus, the bolt action of the American allows it to be silenced better than the semi.

So- ideal single gun? Ruger American 22, quick release Bushnell red-dot sight on raised mount (back to iron sights if batteries become unavailable), at least 2x 25-round magazines, Fenix PD35 flashlight on tactical mount with remote pressure switch, threaded adapter for oil can suppressor or threaded barrel and real suppressor, paracord sling, backup survival gear tucked into the hollow stock under a slip-on Pachmayr butt pad. Oh, and as many rounds of CCI standard as I could get plus a little subsonic and a fair amount of high-velocity hollow-point ammo.

I jumped the gun (no pun intended) on choosing the 10-22 as the one gun to have if you could choose only one. Here’s my rationale and I can say it applies to me. It may not apply to others. But here goes. I live in the Northern Adirondacks and have hunted both small game (snowshoe hares, grouse, gray squirrels, red squirrels, and a few others) and large game (whitetail deer). From my hunting experience, it’s not worth the time, effort and caloric effort to hunt small game here in a survival situation. Small game here is great for sport, but too elusive and few in number worth the effort. You’d starve quicker expending calories to hunt small game here then you would sitting in your easy chair. The .22 round is marginal for whitetail but regardless of what caliber you use deer hunting for survival is a short term effort at best. Almost everyone here hunts whitetail. In less than two weeks the easy does, fawns and spikes will be shot off. What will remain are does as skittish as bucks. In effect, long term survival based on hunting will not happen here, regardless of caliber. Since the .22 round will have little value here for hunting all that’s left is personal defense. The .22 round is marginal for personal defense. No reason to risk your life on a marginal caliber that has little use otherwise. I’d go with a repeating rifle suitable for personal defense- AR-15, AK-47, MIMI-14, Lever Action .30-30, etc. Your choice. The 10-22 is a great rifle (I have two), but as the only gun in a survival situation here, no way. It’s actual usefulness is extremely limited and not worth the risk for personal defense.

This is a good article, I hope to have more such articles .

>22 is between .21 and .23

My “the one” choice is actually a combo. Ruger 77/357 and Ruger Blackhawk 357. I have several different loadings for them. One is 22 grains of H110 and a 125 grain hornady XTP. In the rifle it does 2275 fps and cloverleaf at 100 yards. I get 1600 fps out of the 6” barreled Blackhawk. My “squirrel loading is 150 SWC (carefully hand cast lead) and I use 5.4 grains of universal powder for about 1050/950 fps respectively. I have shot the rifle out to 300 yards at milk jugs successfully. I have taken a dozen deer in the last three seasons with the rifle.

Though it’s not as light as the 22lr it is way more potent and has a wider range of load possibilities.

The problem with the 22lr is that being rimfire the primer is in the rim and with movement can flake off and render the cartridge useless. I have some aged rounds that I was loosing 2 in 10 to “fail to fire”. This is the reason I got rid of my 22’s.

I now have 2 systems. 308 magazine fed semi-auto with excellent iron sights and my 357 setup.

I am not a gun nut, or a hunter, never owned a gun until America elected a lunatic for President and then decided it was time to get a gun because the loony and his goofy cult followers might just launch us into nuclear devastation. Sadly I hope I am killed off in the first attack because who really wants to live in the post nuclear world. But should I survive I chose a Chiappa Double Badger 410/22 over and under. Also in my useless bug out bag is a survival knife, Lifestraw, a windup perpetual flashlight, a couple of magnesium fire starters and a survival blanket. But in reality, no one who brags about this that and the other thing they will do in this event understand just how dependent man has become on the things we take for granted. I find most of the posts here to be ridiculous and just so “Rambo” ish as to not be taken seriously.,

It now appears that .22 lr ammo. Is making a big come back, here in May 2018, prices are a tad bit high,but that is to be expected.Be prepared and ready.Keep your powder dry.

– The only place I would consider a “one-gun” scenario would be in my GHB. Even for ‘wandering the wilderness’ I would tend toward at least two, one being a handgun and the other a long arm. Exactly what I would choose would depend on where I would be.

If the area of operations would be somewhere along the Rockies, or somewhere to the north or western part of the U.S., I would probably tend toward a bolt-action .308 and a .22 revolver. I would seriously consider my Savage 24-C in .22 LR and 20 ga. along with my 4″ Ruger .357 were I looking to be located in the south and eastern part of the country.

As I said, the only place I would consider a “one-gun” scenario would be in my GHB, where I would be looking at how fast could I travel, and not really truly expecting to have to use it. Just as a preparedness measure, should I have to. (It’s always better to have it and not need it, rather than the other way around.)

Currently, that position in my GHB is filled by that same .357 revolver. It’s concealable and potent enough, and I know that I am dangerous to around 300 M with it, if need be. I just don’t think that I want the weight of a long gun, just for the few days I would hope to be on the road to get home.

What if I’m wrong, and that’s all I will have for the foreseeable future? Dad was a Marine; he taught me that the other guy will bring my future long gun to me. All I really have to do, is search his body/belongings for the tools and ammo to keep it running. Vinyl exam gloves don’t weigh much. No one said it had to be my bullet that brought him down, but if threatened…

Cold-blooded? Very, but we will all do what we have to.

– Papa S.

After giving it much thought, over MANY yrs, I have concluded a 22 would be at the 2nd spot on my list of absolute survival tools. Number 1? 12 or 20 ga. Shotgun. Granted you won’t carry 1000 rnds around, but, birdshot buckshot, slugs, you have an all around hunting and defensive, even against bears, weapon. A slug is nearly rifle accurate to 125-150yds, and not much it won’t take. Birds and furry critters in the pot much easier than a single 22. If hunger, weakness and stress from a hungry family are weighing on you, your marksmanship with a 22 rifle will undoubtedly suffer. I’ve always said in a bad time I would want my 12ga and 22, if only 1.. Make mine a shotty.

Spent 23 years in the military, 2 consecutive tours in ‘nam and the better part of 4 months attending survival schools – water, jungle, arctic, E&E, SERE and Psych. None of them included use of firearms, that came with the territory and situations (at the time, situational awareness was not included formally, just some minor suggestions for evasion techniques only
). Did learn how to set small animal traps and use local stuff to build them. As an aircrew member, was issued a .38 S&W airweight revolver and a few extra rounds of ammo. Loud sucker and worthless in a firefight. So, learned how to build a self bow, make arrows, toxic plants, etc. So what does this have to do with subject topic? Just saying that the best weapon in a survival situation is knowledge and a suppressed weapon.

I completely agree. I have a bunch of firearms including a 7.5 inch ar15 pistol with a sbr adjustable brace and a kel tec sub 2000 9mm. Both of these would be good in a survival situation also. I even have a ruger American predator 6.5 creedmore witch can shoot out to 1,000 yards. but if I had to choose just one. I would take my Ruger 10-22 takedown with backpacker stock. I have a compact 3x9x32 scope with qd detach on it. I have 4 10 round magazines and 4 25 round magazines. I would take this with about 5,000 rounds with me. Also If I could I would take my Taurus tx22 handgun with me. That’s an awesome 22 handgun for the money. A 22lr will kill anything it’s all about shot placement. You can kill small game all the way up to 2 legged predators with it. You can hunt and defend if necessary and with a sound suppressor soon to come you can do it quietly. I love the 22lr. I just bought my son a Henry ar7 in viper western camo in 22lr with 3 magazines in the buttstock and a brick of 22lr for his 18 birthday. That’s a nice survival rifle too. If used in a defensive situation a 22lr will kill, terminally injure or scare off any attacker. Once the bullets start flying no matter what caliber the enemie will run away or stop and rethink his decision. Even if you hit someone with one 22lr and they take off if they don’t get any medical treatment they will die of blood loss or infection of some sort it might take a while but it’s inevitable. It will take someone out of the fight defenatly

.17 hmr With Hornady V-max ammo flatter , harder hitting than a .22 or .22 magnum if it’s a survival situation I know it can take any deer with a head shot and the ammo is often easier to come by than .22 rimfire simply because there are probably 100x as many .22 s out there . People are gobbling up all the ammo right now but I know with the 500+ rounds I have it would have to be a real apocalypse for me to run out . And what kind of survival situation would you not be able to get by with even 50 rounds . An invasion or civil war is not really my idea of a survival situation.