Bolt-action Kodiak Defence KD200 now banned by OIC

The twists and turns of Canada's firearms-banning Order in Council continue, with the bolt-action Kodiak Defence KD200 now banned, despite having the exact same characteristics as the majority of this country's traditionally-styled hunting rifles.

In May 2020, the federal government introduced an Order in Council banning a long list of firearms, ostensibly targeting so-called "assault rifles" to prevent mass killings. In reality, the government's ban list included many firearms intended for sporting, hunting, or target shooting purposes.

Since the initial ban list, several firearms have been added without proper notification to owners, and with questionable logic. Now, thanks to Armalytics.ca, we've got the updated news that the made-in-Canada Kodiak Defence KD200 prototype is now banned―see the listing here at the Armalytics website.

The KD200 prototype was floating around gun shows a while back, but it is not in production currently. This rifle is bolt-action only, not semi-automatic like the AR-15 and many other rifles banned by the OIC. It's restricted to five-round magazines, thanks to the intricacies of Canadian law, and is therefore no functionally different than the Remington 700, the Savage Axis, the Lee Enfield, or any other common bolt-action hunting rifle. In fact, those rifles can legally have larger-capacity magazines than the KD200.

Despite that, it is presumably banned under Section 87 of the Order in Council, which is aimed at "The firearms of the designs commonly known as the M16, AR-10 and AR-15 rifles and the M4 carbine, and any variants or modified versions of them."

Two takeaways here for Canadian firearms owners: First, if you've got a firearm that you think even has half a chance of being viewed askance by the anti-gun lobby, it's worth keeping an eye on the Armalytics website, to see if it ends up on the ban list. Armalytics constantly searches the RCMP's Firearms Reference Table to keep track of what changes are made there, and if a firearm is banned, Armalytics will likely tell you before anyone else will (see our initial write-up of the Armalytics website here).

Second, don't think that just because you don't own a semi-auto rifle, you won't be affected. From the very start, the OIC has included bans on big game hunting rifles and other bolt-actions.

If there's any good news in this, it's that the KD200 never went into mass production, so no gun owners are going to see their favourite rifle seized or destroyed.