Gun ownership in regional towns on the fringe of the ACT has surged by close to 25 per cent during the past five years, according to police statistics.
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Gun ownership in the Bywong and Bungendore region increased by 27.4 per cent while the number of licensed firearms in the great Goulburn region increased by 23.3 per cent.
In Captains Flat, a 45 minute drive south-east from Civic, registered guns increased by 18.1 per cent with 417 licensed in May – or one per every two people.
The data, obtained by the NSW Greens, found 2149 firearms registered in the Bungendore and Bywong region (postcode 2621) and 9833 in the greater Goulburn region (postcode 2580).
But despite the increase, these regions were not listed among the top hot spots for rural firearms with 14,757 firearms now registered in Dubbo, 14,542 in Tamworth, and 14,253 in Bathurst.
The data found gun ownership had increased by 10 per cent in NSW since 2010 with one firearm registered for every nine residents in the state.
More than 850,000 firearms are now legally registered in NSW and the biggest increases in ownership were recorded in Sydney's more affluent areas including Pyrmont and Neutral Bay.
Newcastle recorded an 81 per cent increase in the number of people with a firearms licence in the same period.
Earlier this year, figures obtained by The Canberra Times revealed there were more than 18,000 firearms in the territory, close to one for every 20 Canberrans.
An ACT Policing spokesman said there were 5886 licensees in the ACT and the listed firearms included those held by dealers and firearms clubs and privately-owned guns.
NSW Police firearms commander Mick Plotecki said anecdotally, the combination of United States popular gun culture and a recruitment drive by gun clubs may be behind the rise.
Alarmingly, in 22 of the state's 600 postcodes, registered guns outnumber people. This includes four postcodes where guns outnumber people two to one.
NSW Police Minister Troy Grant said there had been an increase in applications for legal firearms ownership but they were for a range of purposes including target shooting, recreational hunting, vermin control and primary production.
"The real concern is illegal firearms which, in the hands of brazen and hardened criminals, are a clear and present danger to our community and police continue to target this illegal activity," he said.
NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge says gains in community safety won since the Howard government's gun buyback program in 1996 have been lost.
"Many people will be quite rightly shocked to find there are many hundreds if not thousands of guns in their suburb," he said.
