How Much Ammo is Enough Ammo? Part One: How I decided how much.

How Much Ammo is Enough Ammo? Short answer, of course, is there is never enough ammo. But I’m talking about how much ammo a person should keep on hand specifically for a firearm they would use in a defensive scenario.

There are countless gun forum discussions, blog posts like this, and YouTube videos about this  topic. Many are pretty reasonably thought out and make some sense, but I find they focus too much on a specific amount don’t explain why. You read and hear people say “you need at least 500/1,000/5,000 rounds per caliber. But they don’t explain WHY you need at least 500/1,000/5,000 rounds per caliber.

I look at it from a different angle. I don’t think about the actual number of rounds to store. I consider how long I want to be able to shoot with the stockpiled amount.

Before the ammo shortage that was caused largely in part by the 2012 gun ban scare, I was like many shooters. I did not keep a good supply of ammo on hand. For most of my life I just kept a box or two on hand for when I wanted to go to the range, if even that.

But that style of buying ammo changed for me in early 2012 when I started shooting pistols and ARs more. A lot more, actually. I really ramped up my pistol shooting at this time since I then just received my CCW permit. Then I’d buy .40S&W by the 250 packs instead of a box of 50 at a time. I considered that keeping a good supply. Boy was I ever wrong.

Then at the end of 2012, I and many others like me got caught with our pants down. There was a push for a gun ban and an ammo shortage came about very quickly. Fortunately things worked out, but there was a time I had to pay too much to keep training with my EDC.

When ammo prices came back down and supplies went back up, I started to stock up. AS I mentioned above, how I determined how much I needed was a bit different than most. My first concern was practice ammo for my EDC. Shooting is a perishable skill, especially with handguns. So I wanted to make sure I could train for a long period of time without resupplying. My first step was to put aside the minimum amount of target ammo to train effectively with my EDC for one year.

For me, the absolute minimum amount I want for practicing is 50 rounds a week. So, I worked on putting aside 2,600 rounds. I did the same for practicing with some other firearms. I figured out what was the minimum amount I would want to shoot with it over the course of a year, and started stocking that amount to be put aside as a reserve.

Far as how much I have on stock that’s not in reserve varies for each firearm or caliber depending on use. Some I still don’t stock much at all, others I buy in bulk and reorder the same amount when I have a certain number left. But on top of that, I have a reserve that is based on my use, not just a number people in a forum agree is a good number.

This is a first in a series of articles about ammo stockpiling and storage. More will be published over the next few weeks. 

Do you keep a reserve of ammo to get you through lean times? If so, how did you determine how much and of what to have in reserve? Please comment below or join in on the discussion on the free West Marshland Armory Forum.

Link to West Marshland Forum Post