I'm getting ready to head home for spring break next week. I'm planning on doing a lot of scouting while I'm home. I'm going to stick to my normal scouting tricks of walking the levee in the mornings and locating some gobbles. Check for droppings at the usual entrances to fields and what not. The company I work for recently purchased 500 more acres in the MO River bottoms, giving my 800 acres this spring. I'm hoping to roam that new property and see if there's any hot spots there. But I just wanted to see what some of you all do for scouting just before season.

I do the same as you. I will scout early and try to shock gobble at first light - I try to make them gobble and when I do - I move quickly to cover as much ground as I can until fly down. Then I back up and try to see each bird that I found gobbling by glassing.
Then I will walk looking for the most amount of sign I can in an area. And I do this over and over and over and over and soon I have developed a pattern of knowing where to be and when to do it. Lots of tedious work - but in the end I bag my tom or toms.

Now I will shock gobble but once on the ground its crow calls or a duck call or a police whistle or a coyote howl ~ BUT I NEVER hen call.

JW

I scout quiet just walk looking for sign and then back out when I find it. Sign has worked for me for years if there is enough of it they are there. I don't want them having any clue I am there watching.