Back before the current ammo "crisis" conventional wisdom was to buy a gun that used the most commonly available ammo.

Then you would always be able to find some where ever you went.

So buy, 9mm, 357 Magnum, 44 Magnum, .223, 30-30. 308, 380 guns etc.

Well that turned out wrong. Many of those have been sold out for months at my LGS's and on-line suppliers.

Instead I find things like 454 Casull, 45 Schofield available.

In my local area the rounds that have remained the most available have been:

Handgun: 40 S&W

Rifle: 270 Winchester

I'm wondering what others are seeing and if there is a pattern in what ammo survived the slump best.

The most common ammo I've seen has been 308,7.62x39 and 22lr. Granted there hasn't been enough 22lr to meet the demand but it has been the most common caliber my local Academy store gets. The rarest of calibers has been 44mag/special, 38 special,10mm, 45acp and 9mm. The rarest of the rare has been 40s&w and 45LC. Only one case of 500 in 45LC has been recieved by my local Academy since January. I got 3 boxes @ 80 cents a round. More than I wanted to pay but it was the first 45LC I had seen in awhile.

In Western New York it has been 40 and 9mm. Most of it is Tula or some other off brand. I also see 270 plus 30-06 and 308 at Dicks and Gander. Walmart is hit or miss but yesterday they had a bunch of 9mm, 40, 45, 38, 380 and even .22.

I picked up 100 rounds of .22 (50 round boxes) limit one - hooray for my wife shopping with me.

They could have avoided the whole fiasco if folks would have said 3 box limit or 1 box limit per ammo type.

Most consistently for SE Pa has been 40 followed by 38/357 and 45 in 3rd place. I have forgotten what 9mm looks like

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i'm seeing 30-06 ,270, 40S&W. i actually sold my 308 and 223 rifles because i couldn't find any ammo for them, unless it was Tula.I'm now shooting 30-06 and 41 magnum, no limit on 41 mag.People are waiting over an hour in line to buy 1 box of Tula 9mm. I refuse to get caught up in that.Maybe the obscure ammo types are the way to go?

I started shooting 9mm a few years ago when .45 went thru the roof. I like 9mm at the range, and you could get it cheap and in unending supply. I've guessed wrong before, probably will again.
At the height of the hoarding, 243 Winchester seemed to be what collected dust on the empty shelf. I briefly considered buying a rifle, just so I could buy ammo when I wanted it.

Locally (western mass) the 22lr are back. One store has even stopped the limit per customer.

7mm magnum and 30-06 at walmart and assortment of scatter gun shells.....Academy had most rifle catridges .....handgun and 5.56 was told they both put out at night whatever hey are shipped and the line begins in the early morning...Before I do that I will just sit on what I have for an emergency and hope things improve while I still able to enjoy shooting!

It was all available at our house-we load.

Nothing at all has been available at local stores. However, when I bought my 15-22, one of my church members told me of a small gun shop about 30 miles away in a small town. I drove over there and he had (at the time) everything... and I do mean everything. Nowadays, he still has just about any handgun or rifle round. He has no .22 LR. He has not raised his prices from what he normally charged prior to the panic. His price on .38 Special is $21/50 rds. with .45 ACP 230 gr. FMJ's running $22/50. I think his prices on other calibers are about the same.

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12 ga 8 shot

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I BACK OUR BLUE

I must be lucky, in the last 6 weeks I've been able to buy

2000+ .22 LR
600 9MM FMJ
300 .40 S&W FMJ

Most has been purchased at local big box stores, with a normal slight mark up.

The only ammo I can't find at reasonable prices is .380

327 mag and 7.62x54R seem the most common around here.

Depends in my area. I have noticed that Ammo is still available as late as the afternoon hours at places like: WalMart and Academy Sports and Outdoors. At Academy--I managed to get 3 boxes of fifty Winchester "white box" 9MM--and today at WM--I scored 3 boxes of fifty Remington .22 cal--and these were priced respectively at: $21.00 per and $1.77 per.

There's only a few shops in the area that carry .41 mag, but they always have it. Used to be my hardest gun to find ammo for now its my easiest.

.45 acp has probably been the easiest "popular' round to buy

I've had no luck at all finding .38 Special, even 130gr. FMJ practice ammo. Certainly none of my preferred FBI load. More proof the J-frames are hot sellers, I suspect.

Insanity. I hope it subsides, but I expect prices will remain well above the pre-feeding-frenzy levels. For the same reason a dog licks certain portions of his anatomy.

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Oh well, what the hell.

Lots of 7mm and 30-30 here mostly 7mm though.

Some .357 and a few boxes of 9mm frangibles.

I'm going to start shooting that 8.36 mm Stroganoff that's been in the back of the closet. Hardly anybody buys ammo for those.

Shotgun shells. The sporting goods section of the big box store where
I grocery shop has a wide assortment of both lead and steel shot as
well as slugs and buckshot in 12, 20 and some 16 ga. Also they always
have a few boxes of 30-06 and 270 softpoint ammo in stock.

Pretty much everything is available now down here. It still sells out quickly at big box stores, but LGS have ammo. During the height of panic though the most common was

7mm, .17HMR, 22-250, and assorted shotgun shells

In my area, 7mm and 270 winchester and 20 gauge bird shot.

That's IT, except for maybe a box or 2 of 243 win or 22-250, and whatever 6.8 special is, never even heard of that.

At my local LGS the only ammo they never ran out of was .22 birdshot. I don't have any rats in the attic so I never bought any.

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Minimize the variables

Like others, I was able to find .40 S&W, .270 Win and occasionally .30-06. 45 ACP came back pretty quick, and 38 SPL was hit or miss. I'll be darn if I still can't find any .30-30. Still haven't seen 22s in a long time, too.

I have had no problems finding 16 gauge ammo, whether it was slugs or anything else. Even Walmart has boxes of it although its always going to be #6. For me Deerslayer I have had no issues finding slugs at the moment. As far as .38 and .357 I have not even looked since I handload and cast my own bullets. I wish I could find some 158 grain .357 Gold Dots though.

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Vaya con Dios

I second that and would add .38 special here in lower Alabama.

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noli illegitimi carborundum

WalMart has never ran out of shotgun shells. I've been shooting clays with my 12 & 20 ga. and blackbirds with my 410-870.

GF

At recent shows in Vegas (including yesterday's), 12-gauge slugs and buckshot are very available at pre-panic prices (say that 3x quickly!). 5-packs of buck and slugs are running $4.75 to $5.25, mostly W-W and Fed with some Rio and Royal. The small dealers even seem to have volume: they ask how many packs do I want. On these same tables, the popular HG loads and .22RF are still inflated. Odd.

There are some cases of .223/5.56, the best pricing being roughly $700 for 1000 rds.

In the Salt Lake City area:
.38 Special, .45 ACP, .380 ACP, .45 Long Colt, .44 Special, .40 S&W and 9mm are nearly impossible to find. Now, delete "nearly."
Nothing but .22 shotshells on the shelves, not even .22 Shorts are seen.
An occasional box of jacketed .44 Magnum shells.
I see .32 ACP, .32-20, .32 S&W Long or Short and .327 Federal Magnum on shelves yet.
Rarely see .25 ACP. I guess the CCW crowd is toting it too.
Yesterday at Wal-Mart they had 2-1/2" .410 shells loaded with 7-1/2 shot, and some 28 gauge shells with 7-1/2 shot. The big sporting goods stores have a good variety of shotgun shells, but some 12 and 20-gauge slug loads are fetching $3 and $4 each, in 5-round boxes!

Last summer, I met a Canadian who lived in Bellevue, Washington -- a ritzy burb near Seattle. He knew some folks who were survivalists, and very wealthy. They built a number of large, metal warehouses for the ammo they stockpiled. He reported they had hundreds of thousands of 5.56, 7.62, 9mm, .45, .22 and other common calibers.
He'd seen it himself, and was flabbergasted at the cases and cases of ammo these folks had stored.
I'll bet they're chuckling now.
And if he knows about it, then you can bet some nefarious types and law enforcement know of it too. Sounds like an open invitation to be forcibly invaded and ripped off.
When something reaches high value, there are always people who will use force to take it.
If I were them, I'd be quite nervous right now.
Myself, I have a small cache of .22 Long Rifle, pistol and rifle ammo. Never enough to draw attention.
It amazes me how I occasionally overhear people in stores bragging how much ammo they have. Might as well declare, "I have three pounds of gold and 1,500 silver dollars under my mattress! I'm set for anything!"
Everything but a pack of druggies with AKs, AR15s and no conscience bursting through your living room door some night!

I don't see much of anything on shelves around Salt Lake City. The most sought-after ammo seems to be .380 ACP and .22 Long Rifle. Those are scarcer than a Job's Daughter in the Playboy Mansion.

The one thing that has been laying on the shelves the entire time in my area is 30-06. Must be because its the preferred deer hunting rifle in my area and everyone must be stocked up on it.

For hand gun 40 S&W seems to be the one that has been setting on the shelves at Wally world many times I have checked.

.40SW and .270 around here. Not much else. I'm not buying and I'm not selling any for a couple more months. Middle of summer should be near normal (as long as some nut doesn't shoot up a pre-school or somesuch). Joe

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Wisdom chases me; I'm faster

Shotgun shells and rifle ammo seem to be less affected by the craziness. All of the normal defense ammo is "hit and miss."

Was at Wal-Mart this morning and picked up some 100 round boxes of Winchester 115 for $24.47/box.

I'm liking that!