This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. Laws on owning, carrying, and using these items vary by state and city and change often. Using any object against another person is subject to your state’s use-of-force laws, and some products here are legal only when used for their intended purpose. Check your local laws before buying anything, and consult an attorney if you’re unsure. Ask a Prepper assumes no liability for actions taken based on this article.
A retailer can ship a .50 caliber rifle straight to your front porch with no dealer, no background check, and no form to sign, provided it loads from the front. A crossbow that drives a bolt clean through a whitetail sells over the counter to anyone with cash. Neither one requires a permit, a waiting period, or a conversation with the county.
Anything that moves a projectile some other way – compressed air, elastic, a charge poured down the barrel – fell outside the definition in 1968 and has mostly stayed there since.
11. The Fire Extinguisher
A five-pound ABC dry chemical extinguisher costs around forty dollars and throws a cloud roughly fifteen feet that takes away a man’s vision and makes breathing genuinely difficult. No state requires a permit for one, and no prosecutor has ever built a case around owning one.
The rest of it is that the extinguisher does its actual job too, which is more than most defensive purchases can claim. Anybody walking through your kitchen sees a homeowner who takes fire safety seriously. Mount one at the top of the stairs and a second inside the bedroom closet, then check the gauge every spring when you change the smoke alarm batteries.
The trouble is the cost, since the store-bought ones expire and replacing them every few years adds up. So it’s worth knowing how to make a fire extinguisher at home, which takes about fifteen minutes with things you already have.
Make a few and put one at the top of the stairs, one in the kitchen, and one in the bedroom closet. At that price there’s no reason to stop at two.
Watch how it’s done:
10. The Kubotan
Six inches of hard plastic or aluminum on a keychain, sold everywhere as a keychain, and it disappears into a closed fist the second you need it. A ridged one runs eight to fifteen dollars and gives your knuckles something to strike with instead of bone.
Most states treat it exactly the way it looks, as a keychain. New York and Massachusetts are the two to check before you carry one, since both have folded kubotans into broader weapon statutes at points, and local rules in a few cities go further than the state does.
Airports and courthouses ban them outright the same as everything else with a hard edge. Buy the plain aluminum version rather than anything with a spike or a glass-breaker tip, since the extra hardware is exactly what turns a keychain into an exhibit in front of a jury.
9. The Bola
Two or three weights on a length of cord, swung and released so the cord wraps a man’s legs from a distance and puts him on the ground before he reaches you. Gauchos used it on cattle for two centuries, and it works on a person the same way it works on a calf.
The federal government has already weighed in here, if indirectly. The ATF ruled that a modern bola-style device is neither a firearm nor a weapon under the Gun Control Act or the National Firearms Act, since it restrains rather than expels a projectile. No state names a traditional bola specifically, though a handful fold “weighted cord” items into broader catch-all weapon statutes the same way they do nunchucks, so it’s worth a quick look at your own code.
Build one from paracord and two tennis balls filled with sand for under ten dollars, and practice in the yard before you count on the wrap landing where you want it. The learning curve is real, and a bad throw just hands a man a rope.
8. The Machete and Other Farm Tools
A machete in Georgia is a brush knife. The same goes for a corn knife, a brush hook, a felling axe, and a fence post driver, and none of them appears in any state’s prohibited weapons list, because every one of them has a job.
That’s because context is doing all the work here. What a prosecutor looks at is where the tool was sitting and what it was sitting next to. So a machete in the bed with the work gloves tells one story, while the same machete under your seat tells a very different one.
For that reason, keep edged farm tools in the shed or the truck bed with the rest of your equipment. Otherwise the cost is a weapons charge attached to whatever else happened that day.
7. The Livestock Prod
Cattle prods hang on a hook near the feed section, run thirty-five to sixty dollars, and nobody has ever been carded to buy one. A hot-shot delivers a jolt calibrated to move a bull, which tells you plainly enough what it does to a man.
The legal picture is where you need to pay attention, because a number of states write their electronic-weapon statutes broadly enough to catch a prod used on a person. Illinois requires a valid FOID card for stun devices. Massachusetts requires a firearms license. Connecticut requires a pistol permit and restricts use to the home. Wisconsin ties lawful carry to a CCW license, though keeping one at home or in a closed case in the vehicle is permitted. Hawaii and Rhode Island both banned civilian stun devices for years, and both bans have been struck down or repealed since 2021, with the rules still being rewritten.
Buying one for livestock is settled ground in all fifty states. Counting on one for defense in the states above means reading your own statute first, because you’d be operating under stun-gun law whether the package says so or not.
6. The Slingshot
Modern flat bands turned a boy’s toy into something that will take rabbit and squirrel out to thirty yards. A wrist-braced slingshot throws a 3/8-inch steel ball at better than 250 feet per second, and a thousand of those balls costs about what two boxes of .22 does.
The ATF doesn’t classify a slingshot as a firearm, since elastic bands aren’t an explosive propellant, so there’s no federal restriction of any kind. Four states break from that:
- New Jersey makes possession a fourth-degree crime absent an “explainable lawful purpose,” which carries up to 18 months. A decriminalization bill has been introduced repeatedly and has never passed.
- New York’ Penal Law makes wrist-braced slingshots a misdemeanor. The plain Y-frame is fine.
- Massachusetts prohibits the sale and manufacture of slingshots with a mechanical boost, meaning the wrist brace.
- Rhode Island groups them with daggers and stilettos under its prohibited weapons statute.
Pennsylvania went the other direction in 2025 and reclassified slingshots as primitive weapons for certain extended seasons.
The store-bought version is fine, but I’ve gotten more use out of the ancient slingshot. No plastic, no factory bands to wear out, nothing a store can discontinue on you.
Find a strong Y-shaped stick, dry it near a fire so it shrinks tight, notch the arms so the bands can’t slip, then lash on tubing and a leather pouch with cordage. That’s the short version. Full steps here: DIY Ancient Slingshot.
5. The Cane
The only impact weapon in the country that boards a plane, walks through a courthouse metal detector, and goes into a hospital or a school without anyone asking you a single question.
A hardwood cane is two and a half feet of dense oak or hickory with a hook on the end, which is close to what police departments carried as a baton for the better part of a century, except nobody reads it that way when a man your age is holding one.
Cane defense has been taught as a formal system since the Victorian era, and it’s still taught today, which matters, since a cane swung wide in untrained hands is easy to take away.
Buy plain hardwood rather than anything marketed as a “self-defense cane,” since the word “tactical” on the listing is the one thing that can turn a mobility aid into evidence.
4. Wasp Spray and Bear Spray
Wasp spray gets recommended constantly in preparedness circles, and bear spray nearly as often. Both carry the same underlying problem.
A pesticide label is federal law under FIFRA, and using a product in a way its label doesn’t cover is a violation. Neither can was ever labeled for use on people. Beyond that, wasp spray doesn’t do what the stories claim, since it’s an irritant with a good stream rather than anything that incapacitates. Bear spray at least contains real OC, but the concentration and volume were calculated for a six-hundred-pound animal, and a prosecutor will make that point to a jury.
Human-rated pepper gel was designed for exactly this and costs about the same as either can. Keep the bear spray on the trail where it belongs.
3. The Blowgun
A .40 caliber blowgun runs about twenty dollars, measures four feet, and puts a dart through a squirrel at fifteen yards. It makes no more noise than a hard breath out, since there’s nothing burning and nothing exploding.
Two states take it off the table entirely. California Penal Code § 20010 makes manufacturing, selling, possessing, or using one a misdemeanor, with an exception only for zookeepers, animal control officers, and veterinarians. Massachusetts prohibits possession outright as well.
Everywhere else it’s simply a tool, though hunting with one is a separate question from owning one, and rules vary state to state: Michigan counts a blowgun as legal for small game, while Florida, Minnesota, and Kentucky rule it out for hunting even though owning one is fine.
2. The Crossbow
No state licenses crossbow ownership. You walk in, you pay, and you leave with a bolt that comes off the rail at 450 feet per second. Hunting with one still falls under your normal game regulations, but that’s separate from owning one.
The real advantage is who can run one. A sixty-eight-year-old with a bad shoulder can’t hold a compound bow at full draw, whereas the Ravin R29X is a sniper crossbow that cocks from the stock with 12 pounds of effort and de-cocks the same way. It weighs 6.75 pounds and sits six inches across when cocked, so you can carry it all day and still swing it inside a blind.
1. The Shrouded .22 Air Rifle
A precharged pneumatic in .22 with a shrouded barrel takes rabbit and squirrel out past forty yards at a noise level somewhere around a stapler clicking. You can work a suburban back lot at dusk and the house next door never looks up.
The ATF has no role here at all, since federal law doesn’t classify air guns as firearms. Several states disagree. New Jersey’s N.J.S.A. 2C:39-1(f) treats any air gun firing a projectile under 3/8 inch as a firearm, which means an FID card and a licensed dealer. Illinois puts anything over .18 caliber and 700 fps in the same category. Connecticut, Delaware, and North Dakota class them as dangerous weapons, and Washington D.C. prohibits carry outside a building.
Everything else on this list eventually runs out of ammunition. A PCP doesn’t have to, since you can cast slugs at home from wheel weights and scrap lead, and the air comes from a hand pump rather than a store shelf. It’s the only projectile system here you can keep feeding after the deliveries stop.
Not Stealth, But Still Worth It
Neither one is stealthy, but nobody expects them to be used for self-defense either, and that’s worth just as much. They’re unconventional, legal everywhere, and cover a job nothing above them does.
Marine Flare Kit
ATF Ruling 95-3 settled the status of these. An unmodified flare gun firing standard pyrotechnic signals is a signaling device rather than a firearm, exempt from the destructive device definition, which means no background check, no license, and no registration.
Two things will turn that exemption into a federal case. Installing a sub-caliber insert so the gun accepts conventional ammunition makes it a manufactured firearm in the ATF’s eyes. Separately, Ruling 95-3 states that a flare gun possessed alongside anti-personnel rounds – rubber balls, wood pellets, bean bags – becomes a destructive device under both the Gun Control Act and the National Firearms Act.
I’ll be honest about its limits as well, because plenty of prepping writing oversells this one. It’s single-shot, slow to reload, wildly inaccurate past twenty feet, and a flare that lands wrong will set your own house on fire. Its real value sits in the truck and the boat, where it does what it was built for and happens to be something no stranger wants pointed at him.
So a better option is a complete marine flare kit built around an electronic flare instead. It costs more than a pyrotechnic set, and the contents explain why. You get a USCG-approved ResQFlare e-flare, a ditch bag, a strobe, a Hemilight life vest light, a USCG whistle, and a signal mirror.
Being electronic, nothing in it expires, which is what earns the money back, since pyrotechnic flares have to be replaced every few years whether you touch them or not. It’s compact enough to carry anywhere, it works anywhere, and I’ve never once regretted buying mine.
The Air Horn
A marine air horn costs about fifteen dollars at any boat supply. What you get for that is a can putting out over 120 decibels, which hurts at close range and still carries three properties down the road. Better yet, no state regulates them.
All that noise changes the math for whoever is standing on your porch. He came for an easy afternoon, but now every neighbor on the road is looking toward your house. Faced with that, most men leave rather than deal with an audience. So keep a can on the shelf by the entry and another on the nightstand. Just swap them out every couple of years, because the pressure fades while they sit.
Even if it’s weird to think of an air horn as a “weapon,” think about it as part of your home defense strategy. You want intruders to stay away from your home, and you probably don’t want to actually hurt anyone. So what you’re after are deterrents, and anything that makes your place harder work than the next one.
The moment they step onto your porch, you can scare them off with a horn through the window. You don’t even have to open the door and make yourself visible.
Even if it sounds silly, this is one of the best ways to keep them away. It’s also only one of the things you’ll learn when you enter the Bulletproof Home program – unexpected, even strange strategies that keep your home safe and help you sleep better at night knowing it is.
Before You Order Anything…
First, check out this list of weapons and guns that you can buy online without a permit.
Then, make sure you do this:
- Search your own state code by the specific item name rather than by category, since “air gun” and “non-powder gun” and “BB gun” appear in different statutes.
- Check your city separately, because Chicago and Aurora both restrict air rifles beyond what Illinois requires, and they aren’t unusual in that.
- Confirm the shipping policy before you pay, since retailers block delivery to restricted states and you’ll get a refund and a cancellation email instead of a package.
Then buy two of them, and keep one where you work and one where you sleep.
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