whats your Bug out gun for?

[Hanzo581]

Cosmoline

I am pretty sure long before you and I were born people indeed lived off the land, sure it is not as easy as ordering a combo meal at your local McDonalds, but it surely can be done with proper preparation and tools.

 

[.45&TKD]

I think it depends on the mission.

How far are you going?
Are you on foot or by car(s)?
If by car(s), will you be able to gas up along the way?
Is the rest of the community bugging out at the same time or just you?
How widespread is the problem?
Is there a safe haven to go to?
Or will you be living off the land indefinitely?
Will you ever be coming back?
Will order ever likely be re-established, as we know it now.

I can imagine scenarios where I might bring my entire collection with ammo, or I might bring 1 rifle and 1 handgun and only the ammo I can carry.

The rifle could be a high powered semi-auto or a .22 bolt action, depending on the mission. Are you fighting off crazies or living off the land?

I would imagine that firearms and ammo could make for good trading and that would beat leaving them for the looters.

 

[dragongoddess]

Hanzo. to put it bluntly. Yes. If you have what I need for survival I'm going to take it if I have too. If it comes down to you or me my vote is for me. I cannot see how anyone could think differently. In survival situations you do what needs to be done if you want to survive. It might not be nice or fit your value system but you have to be alive to have a value system.

 

[loud-mouth shnook]

Damn, darlin'! You're hard core, aintcha? Yow!
And people usedta tease me about bein' scareda women.

In that case...uh...I don't live in the midwest and...uh...I don't have a couple thousand rounds of all the caliber guns that I have...nope, nunna that...or portable equipment and components for another 3500 or so total...in fact...uh...I don't have any guns at all yeah...or...a pond fulla water either...nope, ain't got that...Nope... Me? I'm just waitin' out the 28 days 'til I starve ta death. Nothin' you'd want here.
(ahem)
*looking around and nervously whistling a happy tune*

 

[loud-mouth shnook]

quoted by Glockfan45:
"I am a honest moral person."
"I got no problem putting a pistol in your mouth to feed them."

Not trying to judge or any crap like that, I swear I'm not. I'm sure you're among the majority in such situations, sir.

It just never before occurred to me that I might have to kill the father of one group of kids so that I could remain in the position to preserve the lives of my own. Would that not be indirectly killing his kids too, if they'll starve without him? !!What kinda ****-ty situation would that turn out to be?!! Gotta be another way. Help me out here, somebody. I'd be willing to share what I had in turn for help in protecting the total, provided I knew and trusted the individual(s), I guess. Maybe I'm just a lemming-in-training, I dunno.

On topic, mine would be for threat removal, food acquisition (hunting), and possibly commerce. Trade some game for some water, flour, or whatever. Thanks to my backwoods apalachian roots, I know how to make soap, lye, and stuff like that. Useful as trade goods along with the usual necessities. The old ways could become new again, y'never know.

 

[AStone]

While I'm reading the evolution of this thread, I keep reminding myself of the name of this forum: the high road.

There is a moral and ethical challenge emerging here. I look forward to seeing how it is resolved.

But for now, I'm going to eat some chocolate cookies with a cup of warm milk, and sleep on this one.

Maybe it'll all be resolved when I check back tomorrow ...

 

[Doggieman]

look, let's stay focused and save the ethical discussion for another thread. The question here is what gun and why.

I agree with the poster who says never go to any mass shelter. I'd furthermore say that in a modern major disaster scenario the average person is most likely to be harmed by his fellow man once the initial shaking/blowing/flooding/burning/whatever is over. Assuming you've survived the initial problem, you're going to want to get as far away from everyone you don't know as fast as you can.

I'd say instead of the disaster scenario though the guns I'd bring would depend heavily on the method of transportation I'm using to bug out. I'd get as many guns and as much ammo as I could muster if I were in a car.. you can always ditch them if you have to. If it were (heaven forbid) on foot then I'd carry a couple of handguns and as much ammo as I could, leaving room for as much water and protein bars I could carry as well. Not an easy decision.

Maybe the best bet is to make your bug out sack as modular as you can to accommodate a last-minute decision as to what to take. Things never go down as planned and what you need are *options* in any scenario.

Keep in mind that even in New Orleans, which had an almost absolute breakdown of law enforcement for a surprising number of days, there wasn't a WHOLE lot of gun use. The most harrowing story I read was in American Rifleman where a guy ran off a few other guys just by showing them his AK or SKS or whatever it was. Hardly a gunbattle. I think just having *any* gun in that situation will be enough to safeguard 99% of people in 99% of circumstances.

 

[Cosmoline]

I am pretty sure long before you and I were born people indeed lived off the land, sure it is not as easy as ordering a combo meal at your local McDonalds, but it surely can be done with proper preparation and tools.

The first rule of living off the land is taking what you can when you can. The second rule is having a community or at least a large extended family to help. Expecting to simply go out and partake of nature's bounty after some disaster is naive and doomed to horrible failure.

 

[BigO01]

I would like to comment on the natures bounty folks , unless you are use to living this way and are very good at plant identification Cosmoline is quite right .

Here is a link to a wilderness survival site and a couple of quotes as to what it says in regards to this way of thinking .

http://www.wilderness-survival.net/plants-1.php

Absolutely identify plants before using them as food. Poison hemlock has killed people who mistook it for its relatives, wild carrots and wild parsnips.

Before testing a plant for edibility, make sure there are enough plants to make the testing worth your time and effort. Each part of a plant (roots, leaves, flowers, and so on) requires more than 24 hours to test. Do not waste time testing a plant that is not relatively abundant in the area.
Remember, eating large portions of plant food on an empty stomach may cause diarrhea, nausea, or cramps. Two good examples of this are such familiar foods as green apples and wild onions. Even after testing plant food and finding it safe, eat it in moderation.

WARNING
Do not eat mushrooms in a survival situation! The only way to tell if a mushroom is edible is by positive identification. There is no room for experimentation. Symptoms of the most dangerous mushrooms affecting the central nervous system may show up after several days have passed when it is too late to reverse their effects.

 

[hso]

If you're going to use your weapons to take goods from others and you think that's justified, stick to it. If others don't agree with you there's no need to change your story just to fit in. There is a whole dog-eat-dog, every person for themself school of thought on this issue. But remeber that your position on this may not be correct for many reasons. Putting the ethical/moral issue aside let's look at it from a practical standpoint.

I would be remiss if I did not point out that there were folks during Katrina that tried to take what they needed from individuals and neighborhoods and they met armed resistance. Some were reported killed. Some were not reported. Same for the Cali riots where Korean store owners armed themselves and stood watch while a torrent of rioters and looters swept past them because others had found out they'd actually shoot.

People working in cooperation and coordinating their survival efforts, to include defense, have a much better chance than solo raiders.

 

[hankdatank1362]

Exactly... cooperate with others for the collective good. Or you deserve whatever trouble ou might find.

 

[22-rimfire]

Unless you are forced to leave your home or wish to band together with friends or family in their home, it is best to stay home. Period. The forced departure scenario includes hurricane, chemical or radiological attack, biological attack, earthquake, volcano, and of course an advancing army. Otherwise, stay home. Even the most modest home has more supplies than you can easily carry. Use them to your advantage rather than leaving them for someone else to use for their's.

Few are equipped to "live off the land". Do you know how to preserve meat without a freezer? What wild plants are edible? What's not? Do you know how to grow food? Do you have seed? Do you have a place to grow your own food?

Do you have a form of transportation that does not require gasoline or diesel? Think bicycle and canoe. Do you have a way to haul supplies? Think cart?

In a true end of civilization SHTF situation, millions will starve in the first 3 months. Disease will be rampant due to the dead bodies, general filth, explosion of vermin populations, dirty water, lack of medicine, and declining health of the survivors. The only way to survive is to band together with other people as there is no government to save you. Essentially form a tribe. One man or a family can not hold back a hungry aggressor with firearms (read motivated desperate aggressor). You would just be dead and whatever you had will be taken. It may take a couple of times where you defend yourself, but eventually you will die.

What guns you need depend on the tactical situation. I would be try to be prepared for a Katrina situation and hunting. You will not be able to fight off an army. If you have to bug out, what you take with you depends on what you have, your mode of transporation, and where you are going. Most would have no earthy idea of where to go except to flee whatever is the source of the problem. Most will die if the emergency extends past 3 months.

Very unpleasant choices really.

 

[Lonestar]

Can't we all just get along?????

There is a reason they call it a SHTF situation, people. Social order will fall apart. You cannot assume that your will be using you firearms to protect yourselves from JUST movie style badguys. You will be defending yourself from all types of desperate people; from the typical poor urban ghetto dwellers that did not have the money to be prepare, to the dad down the block with the 5 kids who did not have the time to prepare, and the uber gun nut who rather spend thousands of dollars on Class III automatics and nothing on emergency food and water. You may have to defend yourself from all three.

Handguns are definitely the way to go, and they need to be high capacity. In the War of the Worlds type of situation, when you run into a horde of desperate people, you definitely need something with a lot of shots and the ability to reload fast. Carrying only one 5 shot revolver is not going to cut it. Also, everyone that can shoot a firearm in the house should be armed. If something bad happened both my wife and I would be packing, as my kids get older and start shooting, they would be packing. I also like the idea of pistol caliber carbines and rifles with foldable stocks. I'm taking a serious look at Kel Tec Sub2000, since I already own a lot of Glocks, and the thing folds to almost nothing. Let say you have a 9mm handgun and a 9mm carbine it just seems so easy to grab both weapons, extra magazines, and a couple boxes of 9mm ammo and get out of dodge, then to have to grab multiple weapons with different ammo.

I do see a need for a longun, and if I was not going to go with a pistol caliber carbine, I would definitely go with a foldable stock shotgun, AK, kel-tec .223 carbines, or maybe a ruger 10/22. Depending upon the situation walking around with a longun exposed may or may not be a good thing. At least you have the option to hide it better if your longgun has a foldable stock.

 

[hso]

Ok, this one's gotten a little off on the wrong road.

If someone want's to start a new thread without the insults, feel free.

While you may not like what a member has to say, attack the argument and not the person.