Well, here we are again and I was just alerted by my daughter that Summer is nearly half over…? How does this always seem to happen, we start out with ambitious plans of all the things we would like to get accomplished during the warmer dryer months, only to find ourselves just as short of time and money as we were during the colder wetter ones… Anyway, I have recieved a couple questions from readers and I’ll address them today!

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Question #1   -   “Why .45-70 caliber?”

   This question came in right after the “Tacticool vs. Practicool” post and so I will assume it was referancing the photo in that article… Let me first address this question with an additional photo -

Enough said?

  That’s right… The little one is a 9mm, next is a .44 Magnum and of course the big boy is my newest caliber, the .45-70. Since my plan is to be moving to the country in the not to distant future, I may want to either add some “Country” guns or like I ended up doing, selling some of my overstock to trade for those new additions I had been thinking of. Yes, the AR’s will work just as well in the woods as the they will in the city but something about the lever action carbines had been calling to me and it would seem they would be more at home leaning in the corner of the kitchen than a black rifle might.

  I already was a fan of the .44 Magnum and it has been my choice for hauling along when we are out on the trail. So, initially I was thinking to add a lever gun in the same caliber. This would make sense and keep the calibers needing to be stocked to a minimum… Well, as I did some further investigation into what configuration and manufacture I would end up purchasing, I found the Marlin Guide Gun… It was love at first sight and it was even available in a stainless finish – PERFECT!

  I checked around the web, looking for anything that I could find that might deter me from purchasing this rifle – nothing negative to be found! I saw a multitude of videos on youtube of happy Guide Gun owners firing their weapons. SOLD, I had to add this to my collection. The area or purpose I had in mind for this gun was obviously at the BOL, not that it would live their exclusively but in the long run that is where I saw it.

  Originally, one of the catalyists for purchase was the sighting of a cougar on our land this past spring. While I knew it was around, as well as black bears too, the fact it was actually seen told me that I needed to take more care in keeping a substantial firearm handy! After taking stock of my current collection and not finding a hands down winner that I wouldn’t feel a bit conspicuos carrying around the place if a neighbor happened to come by, I clearly saw the NEED for another gun to be added… With me current holdings, I never imagined that I would find such a blatent hole in my collection to justify another gun purchase but there it was!

   The .45-70 cartiridge has been around for over 100 years and still has a solid following. With Marlin offering their “Guide Gun” in this cartridge, it also told me that it would be more than sufficient against my expected game. I don’t often find myself in the woods with grizzly bears but armed with this firearm, I’d be confident of my ability to protect myself. As a prepper, I like to keep my options open and a gun that is capable of killing grizzly sized mammals would certainly handle the lowly MZB without much trouble at all…

So, this was my train of thought on and how I arrived at the .45-70 for my “Country” or “Practicool” gun needs…

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Question #2   -   “Aren’t you worried that he or they will return. Now that they know what’s there?”

   This question came in responce to my post on my BOL being broken into… Well yeah, I’m concerned that the low down scum suckers might come back for another shopping trip at my place. What can I do though? Abandon the property and BOL project? Nope, the same security threat that I have at our place in the sticks is faced by us at our home in town as well.

   We are kicking around the idea of adding a few surprises… No, there won’t be a shotgun hanging precariously in front of the window poised to fire as soon as the ner-do-good burgler pokes his head inside. This would be illegal -wink,wink! Seriously though, we’ve thought of adding several digital game cameras around the house. The neighbors have also offered to allow an alarm to go off at their place if we can figure out how to make that work. We have ADT alarm company at our city home but with the distance from town to the BOL, the place would be completely gutted before the County Sheriff would be able to get out to follow up on any monitored alarm system…

  On to the second part of the question – “Now that they know what’s there”. This is important, they don’t know what’s there! They only know what they saw in the house… They already took the items from the house that they wanted. While this doesn’t assure me that they wouldn’t return to see if there is anything new to steal or even take additional pairs of underwear, I doubt they’ll be back in the near future.

   The only hint of other potential goodies being around that the burgler may have taken note to would have been the ammunition that they left behind. This was one of the confusing things that was left behind? With the price of ammo these days, I would have expected them to have grabbed the stuff? Oh well? So, they may realise that they found the home of a potential gun owner but I would think this fact might be a deterant to coming back…

   Other than the stuff they discovered in the house, they have no idea what else is on the property. I wish that there were some way to add additional security but I think I’ve done what I can. Like we have discussed here and on most other prepper sites, any BOL that isn’t occupied full time is going to be at risk and mine is no different, unfortunately!

   My advice would be to only store the items at your BOL, that you would be willing to lose… This sounds as though you wouldn’t want to store anything there. While a thief might strip the place clean, it is more likely that they will do what they did to us – pick through and take only the items that are easy to carry and have some potential value or at least value to them (such as my underwear??). Consider caching the true valuables nearby rather than leaving them unsecured inside the home or cabin… We have a couple of cargo containers but even these are subject to breakin if the thief is highly motivated… I think that a middle ground can be found that will allow you to enjoy your retreat property while still maintaining a high degree of security over your hard to replace valuables…

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