If you’ve spent more than, oh thirty seconds on the old Intrawebz thing, you’ll know that’s part of a very old joke listing why guns are better than women. Search that last phrase and you’ll find the joke in a number of places.

Anyway, JayG at MArooned had an epiphany about .22 caliber firearms. You should read his post in it’s entirety, but the short version is that he realized that they are cheap to shoot.

Additionally, they have a the benefit of not being too loud and having next to no recoil. They are great first guns for new shooters to learn on. You can buy 500 rounds of .22LR for anywhere from $13.00 for cheap plinking ammunition to $30.00 for high end competition ammunition. 500 rounds is a lot of shooting, in fact you can shoot all day with one box.

Until about two years or so ago ammunition was relatively inexpensive. Military surplus ammunition such as used by the Enfield, SKS, various Mosin variants, Mausers, and even less well known firearms was really cheap. Even modern ammunition such as 9mm, .38 special, .45ACP, and .223 was affordable. A variety of factors, the weakening dollar, the War Against Fascism, demand for metals such as copper and lead in China and India, and energy costs conspired to double most ammunition costs in a pretty short period of time. As a result, shooters are shooting less and spending more to do it.

Enter the .22 Long Rifle. Like many shooters I scoffed at the .22LR for anything except casual plinking. It’s not considered a suitable self defense round, although it is used for serious target shooting. Early in 2007, I discovered what JayG just realized this morning. Weapons chambered for .22LR are cheap to shoot, many of them are very accurate, and they are fun to shoot.

For once in my life I seem to have been just a bit ahead of the curve. I already owned a Ruger 10/22, which I posted about a couple of weeks back. About a year and a half ago I started looking for a .22LR semi automatic pistol and quickly found a Walther P22 for sale on a local shooters forum. I test fired it and bought it for a very decent price considering how new it was, what was included in the package, and how eager the seller was to sell. While not identical to my Smith 9mm guns, it still is good for training to fire and reload a semiautomatic hand gun.

Right after that, I added a Marlin 25 Glenfield. It was under $100.00 used and came with a scope. It’s a bolt action rifle, so it’s a good training weapon for getting used to working the bolts and firing my various MilSurp bolt action rifles.

About a month ago, I found a very nice Smith and Wesson Model 18 for sale at a local gun shop. It was in very nice condition, but not quite a collectible because it didn’t come with the box, tools, and original paperwork. I was able to negotiate what I still consider a fair price for both the dealer and me. This gun is a dream to shoot. It’s far more accurate than I’ll ever be and like JayG’s Colt it’s a great training weapon for my .38 Special Model 10s. Functionally, they are identical, it’s just the caliber that’s different.

A little bit about ammunition. Not all ammunition is created equal. I have several thousand rounds of Remington Thunderbolt .22LR ammunition. Enough to make the Brady Bunch suck canal water through their collective anuses. The Walther, which is supposed to be fussy about ammunition fires this without a bit of fuss. Although it does get dirty quickly. The 10/22 feeds flawlessly, fires perfectly, and ejects happily with this cheap ammunition. The Marlin doesn’t care, it just digests the Thunderbolts without a hiccup. Not so, the Model 18. It’s a precision piece of engineering and manufacturing excellence and was made in the 1960s when Smith & Wesson was considered the Cadillac of handgun manufacturers and their revolvers were considered the Fleetwood Brougham of handguns. As a result it has very tight tolerances and demands good ammunition. It absolutely hates the low end Thunderbird rounds, which leaded up the barrel the first (only) time I fired them through it. This gun demands copper plated rounds at a minimum. Which it shoots very accurately with, as I mentioned. Still, I can buy 500 rounds for around $20.00, which is less than what 100 rounds of similar .38 Special would cost.

Keep in mind that the .22LR should not be considered a round for self defense use. While it might well eventually kill your attacker, it won’t STOP him in time to keep him from harming you. The idea in using a firearm for self defense is to put an immediate stop to your attackers nefarious activities. Sometimes that results in the death of the bad guy, but that’s the risk you run when you’re a bad guy.

Nor is it a particularly good hunting round, unless chipmunks are your quarry. It is good for target shooting and practicing handling firearms without having to take out a second mortgage.

Everyone should have a few firearms chambered for .22LR in their collection.