Aaron's Stanley Idaho sounds a lot like my little corner of Upstate New York. Certainly not to the extent that hunting is a sole means of meat or survival, but also for animal population control and for supplementing the freezers in an area of little income, potentailly long winters and other cost of living issues.

Then again, there's more of an emphasis on hunting safety and 'respect for the weapon' and a cognizance of when a child is ready to be properly trained. When I hear about the shootings when it comes to 'city crime', my unsubstantiated feeling is that one of the biggest differences in the mentality about guns comes down to rural training and use vs. urban training and use. Maybe it's a stereotype, but I see the lines come down between trained, respectful rural gun owners and panic-shopping for guns in a city environment along with volume gang usage ~ point-and-click mentality, lack of respect and depravity towards their fellow men.

I may have brought this up before, but what's stopping laws pertaining to the purchase of ammunition for guns.  Let people own guns, just don't let them have easy access to ammo.

I'm not a gun owner -- never will be -- so I don't know existing rules about this.

Is the price of buying and storing meat for the winter higher than the price of guns and the ammunition they need?
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Yes, by a lot, that is why they are hunting. The firearm has been passed down, and the ammunition is reloaded by the person themselves. These are not people that come down out of the hills to buy a brand new assualt rifle, and 300 rounds of brand new ammunition. This is a hunting rifle that was bought on the cheap right after WW II. Many Mauser 30-06 rifles were seized by the US from the Nazi's and sold here in the US really cheap. As long as it is taken care of, they tend to have a long life. Meat is stored in root cellars in these places, and considering that the snow starts flying up there around the first week in October, it will stay froozen for a long time. 

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The gutless wonders who compose our government just scuttled an attempt to SLIGHTLY restrict the ability to purchase guns. Do you really imagine they would allow "stealth" legislation like this to slip thru?

They think the govt., black people and liberals are out to get them and they need that gun to protect themselves.

Maybe but I would think that's a very small number. From my experience here in rural West Virginia, I think that the majority of people I know who have grown up around guns (hunters, military kids, kids of police officers...) haven't experienced any kind of tragedy like we've seen in the media. I will say that there are alot of us who are not anti-gun but would like to see Congress do something about gun violence.

I would not at all mind seeing some of my tax dollars go to a Rural Food (and Medicine) Administration. Eliminate the need for hunting rifles. Maybe save a few lives.