The Great 22 LR Shortage of 2009

Status
Not open for further replies.
i have ready access to federal bulk 22 at wal-mart near me (13.47/box). headed to the gunshop tomorrow to check on something else, and as long as i'm there i'll verify, but i do believe they have winchester on hand.

as far as the more expensive 50/100 count boxes of stuff, don't know the availability. i have far more of that stuff on hand than i care to, so i never look for it.
 
After many weeks of reading about the ammo shortage, I thought it would not be a problem in rural southern minnesota. About 2 weeks ago it caught up to us here and the local Wally World is out of everything including 22lr, I managed to find a brick of thunderbolts at Dunhams for 1.49 a box. In the past I would have passed on the Thunderbolts but as the song goes, "These are desperate times".
 
I have been able to find .22LR ammo, but have had to take what I can get. I prefer the Federal 550 round bulk packs, but now I have a mixture of Remington, American Eagle, Winchester and other brands I haven't used in the past.
 
No ammo in these parts either

Same story in AZ. Wal-Mart is totally out of most calibers. No 22LR bricks around for weeks. Rumor has it that gun shops are buying cases as soon as trucks are unloaded. The average customer can't get bricks unless that know someone behind the counter who will save them a box.

One thing to remember is your time. True Federals at Wally World are $13.47 for 550. If you can by a 525 brick at Big 5 for $19.98 go for it. The time and gas it takes to save 6 bucks a brick isn't worth it. The bigger concern is a shortage for 22LR at any price down the road.
 
Saw an auction on GunBroker where a dealer sold 10 bricks of federal 22s for $34 + $6 shipping. That's $40 per brick. Yesterday at a local show I saw crappy Thunderbolts priced at $30.

I have been hearing about the ammo shortage for weeks so tomorrow I intend to swing by Wal-Mart after work and see for myself. I haven't needed to buy ammo for a while because I usually have around 20,000 rounds of assorted calibers on hand and I reload for all but a couple of military calibers where surplus has been cheap but I want to see what's going on.
 
Less than three weeks ago, Bass Pro in Memphis had bricks of it. Last week, Gander Mt in Saginaw, MI had a good bit of .22.
The only shortage I've seen with .22 is in Walmart. No more drives there for me, waiting for chronic understaffing to be addre$$ed.

But how about some US quality?
There are gas blow-backs about every fifth round of cheap Remington at times in my old Savage .22 with new bricks.
But only had a blow-back once in over 700 rounds of surplus Bulgarian in the Mosin Nagant 44s, and it was mild.

Ironic for cheap, oft-maligned "Commie" ammo? ;)

7.62x54R ammo sealed in Bulgaria in 1952, has only once done what cheap All-American ammo, which was produced only weeks ago near Little Rock, USA, does very often.
 
Not so sure the lack of .22's is due to hoarding but more like the centerfire ammo is going sky high so everybody is turning to the "cheap" .22 for their shooting needs.

Plenty of 10/22's for sale around here---cheap bulk ammo---not so much----but there are plenty of 100 packs around---not the cheapest but still affordable.
 
One thing to remember in terms of "hording": You can reload centerfire ammo. You can't reload rimfires. Buy em cheap and stack em deep.

I was buying a brick of Federals at W*M every paycheck. My wife made me stop because I had "so much of the darn stuff already". I wish I hadn't listened to her because I only did this for about six months. 13 bricks of .22 only goes so far.
 
stopped by wal-mart this afternoon and noticed the federal bulk packs had taken a bit of a beating in the last 24 hours - so i picked up another one for sport. probably down to the last dozen or so bricks on the shelf, now.

never made it to the gunshop today, unfortunately... i'll have a look, then.

i did note wal-mart, while short on handgun ammo, did have a very thin supply of ammo available, including 223 and 7.62x39...
 
Most of the bulk .22LR around here is getting bought up. The higher-quality stuff is still readily available.
 
Just left walmart and really the only thing they didn't have was any handun ammo. They even had some 7.62. As for as .22 they had whatever u wanted, a very good selection of every flavor. To bad it isn't payday.
 
Right now I have about 1500 rounds of .22 that I intend to carefully use over the next several months. I'll look every time I'm in a store...when I see a box I'll pick it up. Right now I'm wishing there was another zero on that round count! :D

Mark
 
Nothing on the shelves!

There's not CRAP for ammo here in Oklahoma, neither Wally World or any sporting goods stores can keep ammo in stock, they are all crying that they are getting what little they can, then it is all snatched up as soon as it hits the shelves. .22 is almost impossible to find, and centerfire ammo is always at near zero amounts. They don't have to take our guns if they can starve them to death. I'm collecting my reloading supplies..............
 
bought a bulk of Winchester and a bulk of Remmy at Dick's in VA today.
 
Try your local True Value Hardware store. Ask them to order some if they don't carry any. They can tell you when the next shipment is expected. Call first.
 
I keep Hearing of these Ammo Shortages, but here in Virginia Ammo is plentiful!! Hopefully it stays that way....
Click to expand...

Yup, ammo is decent but not at plentiful as a year ago. I can buy .22lr or 9mm ammo, just might not be the best bargain for plinking. My Federal Bulk packs are kind of scarce, but the higher priced target loads or Remington Bulk packs can be found.

Although they might not be in stock today, more than likely if I go back next week there will be a box or two. Like I said, it's probably far better around here than in most places, but not like it used to be.
 
Tonight Bass Pro seemed to also be out of most types .22. Had not seen it before.
Bass Pro did have some sort of 'high-velocity' .22 for about $30/500 or so.

And I'll admit that I went to Walmart one more time, to look for .303 British (they don't carry it).
They had more than a few small yellow/green boxes of .22 for about $3.50, and some .22 Short, but those Short rounds make a nasty, high-pitched 'crack' sound in my very old Savage.
It's as if a lot of the gas blows back from the chamber with each shot.

CZGuy: Yes, maybe so in an EMB-110 with autofeather and the gear up. But it was a fun machine, maybe more than the Shorts.
 
They said I was crazy last summer when I stocked up with 8500 rounds of .22 LR.
Click to expand...

Some of my friends thought I was going "too extreme" with my ammo "stockpiling" as well. I haven't taken an offical count, but I know theres between 5-10 K of various .22 LR in my stash, of every variety I shoot regularly. .22 ammo is still fairly common here in South Dakota, but "the rush" is certainly showing its face. When my friends questioned my need for so much ammo (I try to keep at a bare minimum 100-200 rounds for every gun I own) I explained the rising prices, the upcoming elections (pre-November) and the fact I didn't want to pay "desperation" prices if the panic got as bad as I feared it might. Lo and behold, much of the ammo I have is either now unavailble or doubled in price, and now my friends are beginning to understand what I was raving about 8 months ago. I won't pay inflated prices, or wipe any one store out of ammo, but I'm continuing to buy ammo when I find it reasonbly priced, not becasue I want to resell at a profit or think it'll be arbitrairly "banned" tomorrow, but becasue I'll use it, and I'd rather have a bit "extra" than "not enough" when I decide to head to the range someday months from now.
 
It's all over the place in Central Florida as far as I can tell.
Click to expand...

I don't know what part of Central Florida you live in, but every time I try to find 9mm, .40 SW, .22LR, or any number of common calibers, I've been plain out of luck. It's been this way ever since the election.

I've had better luck locating centerfire rifle stuff, but I'm not really willing to pay so much for it. The Gander Mountain here (Lake Mary) does sometimes have 7.62x39mm Wolf or Brown Bear, but be prepared to pay $9/20. 7.62x54mmR Brown Bear and Silver Bear are priced at $14/20 rounds! Their XM193 isn't much better: $12/20.

I'd rather wait a five weeks (which I did) for Cabela's to ship me 500 rounds of 7.62 Soviet @ 26 cents per round than get raped by Gander at 45 cents a round. Same thing for the 7.62x54. If I want it, I'll order some cheap surplus online. I'm not paying 70 cents a round to shoot a Mosin Nagant. That defeats the whole point of me having that particular rifle. It's supposed to be my cheap-shooting centerfire - the one I go to when I don't want to feel the financial pain of burning through 300 rounds of 5.56mm and I want something with a heavier punch than a .22.
 
Last edited:
Our Brookings, SD Walmart has been a little slim on bulk .22 for the last few months but there was always a case or two coming in every week or so. Few weeks back everything was starting to look full again and was staying that way and than someone must have come in and bought out all of it and I asked yesterday when it would be back in, but now he says he doesn't know as his warehouse is empty :(




Other places are a little higher than they should, but everything else can be found with the exception of primers.

One gun shop near Lake Benton, MN had probably 30-50,000 primers around not much more than a month ago. I went over there this past weekend and had planned to pick up another brick, maybe two and the only thing left were a few boxes of shotgun primers.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

I
  • Locked
22 lr rifle shortage?
2 3
Replies
50
Views
4K
ApacheCoTodd
ApacheCoTodd
Walkalong
New CZ Varmint .22 LR
2
Replies
29
Views
654
rust collector
R
T
  • Locked
First time AR buyer .22 lr upper vs .22 rifle
2
Replies
31
Views
2K
twofourthree73
T
H
  • Locked
CZ455 .22 lr
Replies
21
Views
760
AMraider
AMraider
ugaarguy
  • Locked
CMMG Dedicated .22 LR AR-15 Barrel Review
Replies
4
Views
4K
wnycollector
W
Back
Top