Ridiculous rates for ammunition will end recreational shooting

[njc110381]

It's times like these that I feel grateful for being at the top of my year group in chemistry. That and holding calibres that will run on black powder! I'd love to use a front stuffer for stalking using my own powder and my own bullets, it would be a great laugh.

I doubt it will come to that, but things sure are getting expensive. How competition shooters will cope I don't know?

 

[JTO]

Of pheasant shooting, it used to be said. "Up goes £1, Bang goes half-a-crown, down comes 10/-" Nowadays, I dred to think what the figures would be. "Down comes 30p" perhaps.
A brace of pheasants would pay for a box of cartridges in the 'good old days'.
There are plenty of people willing to fire £2+ cartridges at ducks with a similar result, and drive 100+ miles to do it.
This is what happens when a hunter gatherer activity becomes a 'sport'.

 

[Heym SR20]

If cartridges are expensive or scarce or both then they are used sparingly and you make every shot count. When I lived in Zambia and Zimbabwe in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s ammo was very difficult to get hold off and when you did find it was very expensive. Friends who were trainee PHs pretty much relied on ammo left behind by clients. They didn’t care what load or brand the cartridges were, they used them. And they were pretty much only used in anger.

There was 303 - There were handful of cartridges and I never fired it. The only gun that was used was a 22 rf as cartridges were more available and that was used to shoot snakes and to shoot pigs and cattle. And if you were after meat for the pot well it was 1 bullet, 1 Guinea Fowl.

 

[User00040]

Best result of 2022 just got me mitt's on 1k fed215 mag ,1k CCI 2500 & 500 CCI benchrest guy giving up got the lot for £50
I don't even use CCI

I'm coming to knock on your window until you give me some

 

[ChesterP]

My understanding is that the major hunting/shooting organisations have agreed a 5 year transition to non lead ammunition and we are in year 3 I believe. However I don’t believe there is going to be hard legislation in place at the end of that period, BASC etc have been working with a government body to agree the timescales.

Which is one of the reasons that I cancelled my "shooting organisation" membership. They have a habit of selling their members down the swanny by agreeing to things we do not agree with. That is when they were not infighting or hiking prices.

 

[Liveonce]

Tazz said:
My understanding is that the major hunting/shooting organisations have agreed a 5 year transition to non lead ammunition and we are in year 3 I believe. However I don’t believe there is going to be hard legislation in place at the end of that period, BASC etc have been working with a government body to agree the timescales.

and what happens at the end of year 5 when the likes of wildjustice demonstrate that game is still being shot with lead shot and sold containing it. They will be calling indeed shouting for legislation to ban lead as self regulation has clearly failed. Apparently just 3% of cartridges sold are non toxic shot, how that splits game and clay pigeon don‘t know but we probably are far from all game cartridges sold and used being non toxic shot and biodegradable wads.

So if we want to avoid pain at the end of the transition for game shooting we properly do need to make that change.

 

[badmolassesaccident]

Makes me laugh when someone throws in brexit ? Ammo prices are rising world wide dueto the price of commodities nothing to do with brexit or Boris, ammo here is averaging $59.99 for 20 in the major brands, put on average $10 cheaper, magnums $79.99, creedmore $69.99 and 6.5x55 $99.99 all up $10 on last year, strangely we have not joined or left the EU.

Meh, I was at a RFD earlier this month. Big one, lots of guns, lots of ammo. As I got my carton of £3+/round ammo, he was telling me what a total cluster Brexit has been for (a) getting stuff from the EU and (b) selling stuff to the EU. This was an entirely higher level of cluster for him, above the well known worldwide price increases.

 

[badmolassesaccident]

Anyway, with regards to ammo cost: I might go through 20 rounds stalking/hunting a year. I go through a few thousand target shooting. Does it really matter how much ammo costs if you don't target shoot? It must be just about the cheapest part of shooting?

 

[308tikka]

Meh, I was at a RFD earlier this month. Big one, lots of guns, lots of ammo. As I got my carton of £3+/round ammo, he was telling me what a total cluster Brexit has been for (a) getting stuff from the EU and (b) selling stuff to the EU. This was an entirely higher level of cluster for him, above the well known worldwide price increases.

If one looks at the common brands of ammunition in the UK, how many are sole EU origin?

PPU, serbian
Hornady, Winchester, Remington, USA

Norma Swedish, owned by RUAG, Germany
Lapua, Finnish
S and B, Czech

VV and RS powders yes, and the best brass is Lapua and Norma but most primers are US
Most bullets are US.

I dont have sympathy. Dealers and distributors knew the result in 2016. Adapt or die.

 

[badmolassesaccident]

^ Without derailing this into a Brexit thread, the dealers did not know in 2016 about this as the EU trading arrangement was only determined just before Christmas 2020. Further, at the time of the referendum, we heard, "“Increasingly, the Norway option looks the best for the UK” (Aaron Banks, Leave.EU founder; Norway is in the Single Market), "“Wouldn't it be terrible if we were really like Norway and Switzerland? Really? They're rich. They're happy. They're self-governing” (Farage; those places are in the Single Market), "“Absolutely nobody is talking about threatening our place in the Single Market” Daniel Hannan MEP. That RFD's problems are a direct result of not being in the Single Market.

Further, the dealer was talking about his exports of firearms to the EU, which have collapsed due to non-tariff trade barriers. I might add that my idea to drive to the Cold Bore range in Denmark via France, Belgium and Germany with a car full of guns and ammo, has also collapsed as my European Firearms Pass is no longer valid and I would have to obtain a visitor firearms permit for all of France, Belgium, Germany and Denmark.

 

[Pedro]

It's all transitory. Things such as shortages, Brexit and Covid affect things in the short term (although that short term could be years). Market forces will eventually prevail. If there's a demand for ammo, sooner or later someone will want that business and provide it. If the overseas difficulties go on for some time, there will be someone somewhere in the UK that'll step up and get the business. Or the overseas providers will find a way. I know the UK market is a fraction of, for example, the USA. But it's still a market that makes a few quid.

 

[bally]

My first pint was 15p now easily £3.

Full car with petrol for 10 Bob, now lead free it's £70.

Pint always lead free

I REMEMBER WHEN A BIG HOO AHH ABOUT IT GOING TOO A £1 A GALLON

 

[glasshalffull]

It's all transitory. Things such as shortages, Brexit and Covid affect things in the short term (although that short term could be years). Market forces will eventually prevail. If there's a demand for ammo, sooner or later someone will want that business and provide it. If the overseas difficulties go on for some time, there will be someone somewhere in the UK that'll step up and get the business. Or the overseas providers will find a way. I know the UK market is a fraction of, for example, the USA. But it's still a market that makes a few quid.

Disagree. Prices have been held down by the extremely low interest rates for years which is all about to end. The rise of fuel and raw materials will continue upwards and manufacturers have no choice but to raise prices now the inflation genie is out of the bottle. Unfortunately the trend is inexorably upwards from now on I'd say the only hope is for wages to rise accordingly

 

[Jamsie]

Lot of primers already at £95 per hundred

If you are paying that amount for a hundred primers then you are plain daft! I reload for a lot of calibres and primers are usually in the region of £6 a box of one hundred.

Jamsie

 

[gixer1]

If you are paying that amount for a hundred primers then you are plain daft! I reload for a lot of calibres and primers are usually in the region of £6 a box of one hundred.

Jamsie

He surely meant 1000….

 

[Jamsie]

He surely meant 1000….

I'd like to think so. That's why I always proof - read anything I write BEFORE I hit the send button.

Jamsie

 

[gixer1]

I'd like to think so. That's why I always proof - read anything I write BEFORE I hit the send button.

Jamsie

Even at 1000 it’s expensive!

 

[User00035]

Seriously? I cannot understand why , if a client puts three on the target he hasc7 left now to shoot one deer is not even an issue . That's still six rounds spare

My .308 only holds three rounds in the mag. As I very rarely expect to shoot more than one beast at a time, I frequently go out with just the contents of the magazine for ammo. Saves having a heavy box banging around in my pocket needlessly.

I've often come back with all three rounds still intact but I've never run short.

 

[JTO]

I REMEMBER WHEN A BIG HOO AHH ABOUT IT GOING TOO A £1 A GALLON

I REMEMBER WHEN A BIG HOO AHH ABOUT IT GOING TO 5/- A GALLON, less than the price of a dozen hen's eggs at the time.

 

[The deer man]

The detection units at the game dealers will pick it up unless your recreational only and don’t use a dealer

The dealer I use (one of the biggest in the country) has no testing apparatus that will detect a carcass having been shot with lead or copper nor do the other two dealers I know. This is just scaremongering and as already said a "myth".

What dealers may ask you to do as we have done for ours is sign a declaration that all deer will be shot using non-toxic bullets but there is no way of proving it either way especially if it's a head shot.