Ammo shortage, are you see more or less shooters at the range and matches?

I see the shooting pace picking up a bit.

mcb said:

I find it curious everyone is buying all this ammo at higher prices due to the market issues and yet we are not seeing increasing shooting activity at ranges and shooting events. All this ammo is just sitting at people's homes doing nothing? Seems that if your buying ammo now it should be to shoot it since your buying high and its only going to lose value in this market. People are strange...

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Because buy now with worry it won't be available later and then ration it. I am not buying much ammo right now I stocked up pretty good pre panic but there were a couple calibers I was and am in need of. I bought 200 rounds of 7.65 Argentine two weeks ago from SG ammo at $.95 a round, pre panic a year ago it was $.75 a round, now in the last week they bumped it up to $1.50 a round so glad I got some two weeks ago because that ammo being it is oddball and imported might be a while before it comes again.

7.62x54mm Mosin steel cased ammo had not risen much in all this but in the last month it fell victim also and is also going up. Where does that ammo come from?, from overseas, and between COVID production being down and Biden easy way to ban stuff is on imports well...........

I've had to buy, well, because I'm obsessed with getting new guns. No reason to have one if I cannot shoot it. The only one I haven't shot yet is the Tokarev.

I've got plenty, but if I go to the range it is either for a new gun to test/work out or my carry piece to practice. Honestly, I do more practice at home with lasers.

The outdoor range was just about full (using every other shooting position, due to COVID), the last time I went.

The ammo shortage did seem to drive a tactics change in the last rifle “CQB” match I shot. The scoring rules to avoid a penalty per target are that you have to score at least 1 A-zone hit or 2 B/C-zone hits per target, as I recall. A year ago, most people were doing fast double taps on each target to ensure a good hit, and someone actually commented that I was running a scoring risk by taking only one shot per target. But then a couple months ago, I noticed that everybody was shooting only once per target. At $1/round, a 40-target match gets a lot more expensive if you double tap.

I usually shoot early mornings and before this mess I was basically there with one or two others. Lately the indoor range has been at least half full (15 stations), before I leave.

On a weekday last week I went to my indoor range(10 lanes) and I was the only one there for the hour I spent there.

mcb said:

I find it curious everyone is buying all this ammo at higher prices due to the market issues and yet we are not seeing increasing shooting activity at ranges and shooting events. All this ammo is just sitting at people's homes doing nothing? Seems that if your buying ammo now it should be to shoot it since your buying high and its only going to lose value in this market. People are strange...

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The feeling I get whilst standing in line for ammo at various places is that out of those those that aren’t reselling is that they’re purchasing out of fear of future unavailability.

It’s kinda like “I better get it now before it’s gone, regulated, or simply banned.

But, related to the OP question. Definitely seeing less. Heck I’m going less.

I went to the excellent Triple N range yesterday and it was a ghost town. Me, the RSO and another guy. When I left at about 11:15 there were maybe 6 people. Joe

I have my own handgun range on the property, thus there is me, myself and nobody else. At the mid point of my seventh decade I haven't been shooting, its more weather related. When I do resume shooting I'll be shooting less rounds per session. I see shortages of ammunition and or components being along term problem as the marketplace replenishes. We simply don't know what we don't know in regards to what the new normal is going to be. At a dollar a round I'm not buying!

The is a regular shooting event (match might be a overstatement) at my shooting club. It has been 'down' in attendance, but it's hard to separate the short supply of ammunition and components from the COVID panic and the spell of cold weather locally. Warmer (a relative term) weather has upped our attendance. Many of the 'health restrictions' have been relaxed, coinciding with the warmer weather.

I'm sure being short on 'discretionary' ammo is part of it.

We're seeing the same number of shooters right now but many are shooting .22s instead of their centerfire guns. Lots of complaints about finding primers for reloading. Some guys are saving their centerfires for State and National matches instead of the locals.

I've switched to all .22s now.

The outdoor range has the same number of people, or maybe a few less. The BRASS tells no tales - the brass rats are out in force, half to reload, the other half to sell as scrap. I have to watch my brass like a hawk.
I am running out of components, but that's because I am still loading. Components sitting on the shelf do me no good - loaded ammo does.

Haven't been to the range since checking the zeo on my slug gun in November. Have taken my rimfires out for small game hunting & lots of plinking. I've checked with friends who use the local indoor ranges, they tell me hardly anyone there, not shooting much. No surprise, the price for ammo they're charging.$95 for box of 50 .38 special st one place. I hope you folks can do better than that.

Looking at the registration of our next Steel Challenge Match there are the same number of shooters but there will only be 5 stages instead of 8 so people can get by shooting less ammo.

Went up to the National Forest shooting site yesterday with my 2 sons..'Normally, hardly anybody but yesterday, VERY crowded. Of the 7 'areas', slots, 6 were occupied. PLUS..guy next to use had a really nice M1A1, 308..and didn't seemed bothered by shooting probably 200 rounds outa it. Some dude sounded like he had a full auto something..expensive. BUT everybody we saw, lots of stuff shot, lots of rounds, very few were 22..

We were there about 3 hours. Lots of 223/556, 9mm, 38 special, some 22LR..

Pat Riot said:

Edit: I hate auto communista. It always changes ammo to ammonia.

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It's all just nitrates, comrade.

I haven't been to the range since November. Part of that is because the Conservation department, in their infinite wisdom, closed it recently for three months. It opened again last week and someone I know went a couple of times. On the nicest day of the week he said there was one person there when he arrived...there's twenty-two lanes at this range. At this point I think the ammo I have is just going to be a hedge against the coming hyperinflation.

I am seeing fewer shooters at the gun club I belong to. I have curtailed my shooting as well.

Boycotting ammo until supply catches up and brings prices back down.

You'd be startled how many people are out there with zero ammo on the shelf. If every one of them buys a box or two during this whatever,......... it's the same thing as the run on toilet paper and ground meat.

The people chewing through 3000+ rounds a year ain't the ones causing this. I think the main market is standing down. There's a glut of newbs and weekend warriors all of a sudden buying.

Used market is going to be huge, if normal ever happens again.

Our range requires an annual renewal, and yesterday was the designated renewal day, I help with the drive along with a dozen or so of other members, usually takes several hours, but things got slow around 9:30, and I was home by 10. Membership dropped off quite a bit over other years. My range trips are usually with a couple of my grands, and now we can go on weekends, nobody shooting those days, I reload for me and my grands help. I still have plenty of components so I'm not cramped...just a lot less crowded now. Think a lot of the members are out of ammo, and are waiting for things to settle down.

The range I go to is a lot less crowded. They offer a half hour and a one hour price and also a monthly price. Guy who works there said almost all sales are now half hour very few one hour and even fewer monthly.
Last time I was in, I didn't even use my full half hour! Just tested a clip of Hornady CD in my Kimber M9. burned up some old .38sp in my junk yard dog Saturday Night Special Arminius (don't ask!)
and I was out of there!

Hi...
I haven't been to the gun club in about 6-7 weeks because of the cold, wet and snowy weather.
Went to two clubs today . Shot for about 4 hours...never saw another person.
Nice.
My son and I pretty much filled two five pound coffee cans with fired handgun brass.
Lots of rounds downrange in a bunch of calibers.
First time shooting my new Taylor's 1873 lever action carbine in .357Magnum. Like this rifle...just a bit high accuracy wise at 25yds. Action is a bit stiff and the trigger pull is kind of heavy and the loading gate is hard to push open... hopefully that will work itself out with some more shooting. If not, I will see what my local gunsmith can do to smooth things out a bit.