The thread’s header splains it. Do you pack/carry a firearm when going on a multi day canoe trip?
With me, it all depends upon where I’ll be going. The WI river was recently brought up here and going there, I never saw any need as that was well travelled, popular, and close to towns/houses. But as I got older, my desires not to be around people become stronger, so my tripping was to get as far away from others and civilization as I could.
Using rivers to travel removes a lot of the slugs who can be problems, and the further away from a road/parking area, the less they are. Yet the further away I am, the more likely it is I’ll bring a firearm.
I have a compact 22LR pistol I bring. It’s nice as it fits into a pocket in any shorts I’d be wearing. Why do I bring one? It’s sort of like the question of ‘why wear a lifejacket/helmet?’
Or a first aid kit. Or a fire extinguisher in your house.
I mostly go solo and national forests are where I go, the more remote the better.
Really depends. I wouldn’t bother with a 22 as I don’t carry to fend off squirrels and raccoons (just busting stones) . Animals of the two legged variety are far more dangerous. A 45 is the most likely candidate for me, maybe my 380, if I need something really light.
If I paddled places where I had to worry about brown bears, I’d have a sizeable revolver or a 10mm in a very accessible holster
Location also matters. I can’t carry in NY or CT, but most of the rest of the country is ok
I usually carry a Luger LCR in .357 mag but rarely give it much thought.
For wilder country a Smith .44 mag.
For Alaska and the Yukon a Marlin Guide Gun in .45/70.
It is really just an old habit. Being smart keeps you safe.
Bear spray is really good to have on your hip for close encounters.
Pretty much always packing, even driving to the store.
What I pack depends on where I’m going though. I spend all of my outdoor time in Grizzly and moose country, plus there’s nearly always something in season that I have a tag for.
I have a 22 pistol with me most of the time simply because it’s fun to shoot and it’s about the only thing I can keep enough ammo around for.
I also pack larger guns when the situation calls for it.
The most accurate pistol I’ve shot was a SW, ported 44mag. It was a friend’s gun and I couldn’t talk him into selling it as his dad gave it to him.
I’m not a revolver guy but it was just a very nice shooter. 2nd place was a Colt 357 I borrowed from a friend. Both were nice.
That’s it for me. I shoot a few times per week to every day, depending upon my mood, so the cost of ammo is the main driver. That’s 500-1K rounds per week, so I’m pretty handy with it. Another reason why I carry a 22 is they are my least expensive pistols, so if for some reason we part ways, I won’t be as mad.
Black bear, wolves, and coyotes would be the issues and the sound of a few shots should make them change their mind if they take it that far. I know for a fact that a 22lr will kill a big husky as neighbor had to put one down as it became a threat.
What I’d really like to do is bring my dog, but I don’t want to put my dog at risk like that.
I have a pistol and several rifles chambered in 22 LR and I enjoy shooting them. It is a great caliber for inexpensive target shooting and practice. But my reason for having a firearm on a downriver trip is personal protection against animals of the two-legged kind. The goal there is to stop as quickly as possible an immediate lethal threat and I don’t consider 22 LR to be well-suited to that task.
Apart from the small mass of the projectile, standard velocity 40 grain LR has a very meager projectile momentum of not much more than 6 lb-f/s. Many feel that effective self defense handgun calibers need to deliver a momentum of 20-30 lb-f/s.
Not only that, too many misfires with a lot of rimfire cartridges. And the rimmed cartridges do not always feed and chamber smoothly from a straight magazine. If I did carry a 22 LR handgun for personal protection it would be a revolver. That eliminates the potential failure to feed issues and in the event of a misfire you can at least go on to the next cartridge in the cylinder.
There is in fact no guarantee of being able to quicly terminate an immediate lethal threat with any handgun caliber but the chances of doing so are higher with 9 mm, 40 S&W, 45 ACP, 357 Magnum, or 10 mm.
44 Magnum is very potent but I doubt that I could control it adequately. All of the above mentioned I have shot many times.
That’s a great answer, and very informative as to your perspective of what if’s…I guess, I’m wondering if you’ve ever been in a situation where you were glad you had your protection due to some jackass interacting with you? Or a bunch of jackasses…
Never drawn a firearm on anyone and hope I never have occasion to do so. There have been a couple of times when I was glad to have one close at hand however. I won’t go into any specifics on a public website.
Years ago I used to take off for a week at a time and bum around rivers in the southern Appalachians sleeping in the back of my pickup truck under a Leer cap. Sometimes this was just by the side of some very rural road. Kind of spooky when you hear a car or truck pulling up at 3 AM and stopping when they see your vehicle. I always wondered what I would do if someone wrenched the window of that truck cap open. That never happened.
Back in those days I had kids in the house and they had friends visiting. I didn’t want to shell out for a gun safe so I didn’t keep any firearms in the house. I did have a KBar by my side in the back of the truck, however. If I ever did that kind of thing these days it would be something more than a combat knife, however.
Here’s where I’m at… I have 4 rifles and a pistol… and I keep a couple thousand rounds , but I keep the ammo in a Harbor Freight Safe in the coolest part of my basement just in case(oh no) my house caught fire…Here’s the problem, If a law enforcement officer ever had to enter my home, I’d probably be classified a danger to the area… My M&P 15-22 can go through 300 rounds in a half hour…
OH… and I only bought that rifle when President Obama thought about restricting those AR type rifles , I do have wall art in 2 Henry Golden Boy’s Americam made or not made at all…
Wake up coherent would be a great start. After getting more supplies at wallys in vail, plan was to sleep overnite in my van in parking lot, meet up next moring and go. I took a pill for an injury I had and washed it down with a beer. Then off to sleep.
I half woke up by the sound of the front passenger door being tried. Groggily I sat up as the side sliding door was then tried. It too was locked and I yelled as I got up and got out. I saw a ******* running away. I cussed him out in spanish, then went back into the van.
I’m lucky as I never locked the sliding door on the van but for some reason I did before going to sleep. If I didn’t lock it, I would have woken up to him jumping in the back of my van–and on me laying there, groggy, with a Kabar in my hand.
That let me know how important it is to think about security when vehicle sleeping as vehicles seem to be magnets for trouble. Rest stops too.
I often kayak where there are lots of Wolves, Black Bears and Brown Bears. I never carry a fire arm though Brown Bears do give me pause. The Coastal Wolves keep me safe from Black Bears and, while I respect them, I know that they won’t mess with me unless I do something stupid. They are more apt to steal my shoes at night but they do keep the Black Bears away. Black Bears know that they are below the Wolves as far as predation goes. Find a beach with fresh Wolf tracks and you don’t need to worry about the Black Bears. Brown Bears stay away from the Wolves, also and are usually on the mainland beaches but more and more and swimming to the outer islands. They are a bit of a wild card and the thought of them ensures that I keep a clean camp and keep good practices.
Since I don’t feel the need to shoot anything, including target practicing, I don’t carry in the back country where I live.
Pretty quickly. That’s what’s a blast with a 22LR firearm. Just did a quick inventory and I’m down to a little over 15K left but some stores are starting to get them on the shelves and not at scalper’s prices. I just picked up 2K and it came to 7 cents a round, the top end of what I’d normally get them for.
I’m a pistol shooter w/22LR tho. Going thru the base draw and shoot evos, it’s 240 rounds. I’ve found to save on rounds shot, put up 2 targets, draw and shoot one then move to the other, get the sight picture and rest on the trigger reset. You’re good to go, but don’t shoot, just re-holster it. This way you can ‘shoot’ 480 rounds of multiple targets, but only shoot 240.
22LR should be the first to come back on the shelves and come down in price and it appears it is.
I’ve fired about 30K 22LR rounds and the only misfires, duds, I’ve had were very few and I could attribute to a firearm. All of those rounds were lower priced bulk ammo. CCI is top shelf and should have no issues.
The problem firearm was a ‘fake stryker’ fired gun, so like a single action. Same firearm had feeding issues. And ejection issues. It was great to work with tho as it really got my gun clearing mechanics down pat.
A pistol I’ve never had a misfire with, feeding issue with, never any problems with is the ruger SR22. They did their homework on the problems of others then designed this one. The trigger is a very very good trigger, very crisp. It’s a hammer fired, so if one does get a misfire you can just pull the trigger again.
This will be the pistol I’ll bring with me. The only critters that might not run away at the sound of a gunshot will be the two legged kind. I’ll have 21 shots to change their mind.
. Animals of the two legged variety are far more dangerous. A 45 is the most likely candidate for me, maybe my 380, if I need something really light.
