how do you go about scouting a new area?

[new2turkey]

hi guys, i'm a novice hunter, eager to get after the birds this year.... With that being said I'm hunting southern Maine, and being on my own starting out my knowledge of good hunting spots is very limited.... There are tons of woods out here and you can hunt anything that isn't posted, i just don't know if the spots I've been scouting hold birds. So what do you do when trying to find new areas not knowing if there are birds there or not?

thanks,

Nick

[bmhern]

If I don't know an area the first thing I do is track the roads, you can learn where they are moving, when they are moving, and what is moving. Just a good way to start.

[cornfedkiller]

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[Greg Massey]

I started last year using trail cam. before our deer season and have come to really like using them. i'v been running 5 cam on my hunting properties and last week i pull the cards with a lot of turkey pictures on the cam. I did some road looking and found several tracks etc. I don't like to make a lot of trips looking for turkeys were i'm hunting because i don't want to bump the birds a lot..I will go early some morning and just listen from some high points off the main roads on my hunting properties. Good luck this year..

[chcltlabz]

There's a few ways I go about it.  Areas I hunt are different than Maine for sure, and I'm hunting public land spots, sometimes quite a ways from home.

My first stop is Google Earth.  You can learn a ton about an area you're considering scouting or hunting by looking over the sat shots.  Things I look for are a good mix of hardwoods and fields, and for my areas I will distinguish between the hardwoods and the pines.  I know, in some areas the birds will frequent the pines and thrive in them, but most of the areas I hunt, the pines are too thick with greenbriar and hard to even maneuver through.  I'm also looking for trails and no roads that I can move on to cover as much area as possible.

The reason I'm looking for fields is not necessarily to hunt birds on a field, but the fields are going to concentrate the nesting hens (almost all of a poult's diet are bugs, so they will usually nest in areas with them, which here means fields).  Gobblers will be where the hens are.

I also want an area that isn't easily accessible by lazy hunters who will call from the road and drive everywhere.  I like to be able to walk trails, but don't want anyone to be able to drive into the same spot and mess everything up. 

Sometimes, that's as far as my scouting will go, and the first time I'll set foot in an area will be when I'm hunting.  I'm a run and gun hunter from first light, so that's what works for me.

If I do scout, it will be listening only and I will do it with as little interference and disturbance as possible.

[Bowguy]

First thing Id do is wait till they're gobbling good pre season n locate em by driving the roads listening. You'll know where concentrations are

[born2hunt]

Once I have studied the area on Google Earth and have a good idea how to navigate through the property  finding sign is my first priority.  Scratching, tracks, dust sites, feathers and crap. Now finding these doesn't tell you when they will be there but it's a sure sign they have been  in the area and where to focus your efforts.

[OldSchool]

Starting blind, I'd try to find some high ground to listen from in the mornings where the birds can be heard for a ways and I'd spend some early mornings doing that. I'd look for birds/sign around any open ground/fields you may have available and when I found some birds, I'd hit the woods for a good look around. 

Good luck!

Bob

[yella yelper]

Find a high spot and listen in the mornings. Bring you a compass and record the bearings and estimate distance. Go to a map/Google Earth and you can get a better idea of where they are and what type of terrain they're using.

Also look for scratching in the woods. Be careful that you're not tracking armadillos though. Good luck and just remember, you learn by screwing up

[new2turkey]

theres some good info here thanks for sharing .... our season isn't until may so hopefully they'll start gobbling soon, ill be doing some listening

[Marc]

Birds are most vocal in the mornings or evenings...  Birds are most active and visible during those times as well...

Although I hate getting up at the crack of dawn to scout (it is somehow easier when I am hunting), it is the best time to figure out bird behavior.

If I am looking at a new property, and have seen no sign (actual birds or footprints), I will walk prospective areas and try a locator call or an actual hen call before the season in the early morning...  As soon as I get an answer, I shut up...  I just want to know there are birds on the property and about where they are...

Once I have a bird located, I would try to figure out what they are doing and where they are going once they leave the roost (as unobtrusively as possible).

If I can roost birds in the evening before I hunt, that is ideal.  Sometimes they are quite vocal as they hit the roosts in the evening (sometimes not so much).

Dirt roads are a great place to look for birds, cause you will see footprints...  Generally there are preferred areas of crossing, and these are great places to look to hunt or to start looking for birds.  There are books and links that will show you how to differentiate a gobbler footprint (or even poop) from a hen...

http://www.wildlifedepartment.com/hunting/turkeylook.htm

Opinions will vary, but I think a good box call is one of the best calls to start off with (and still one of my favorites).  It is loud, easy to use, and the easiest call to make realistic sounds with, and in my opinion one of the easiest calls to elicit a gobble with.

Once I know there are birds on the property, I do not like to call if I am not hunting.  However, in my area, often times good looking properties do not hold birds, and I do not want to waste my time hunting an unproductive area...  I always make sure that I have seen or heard a bird anywhere I am going to hunt.

[turkeyfoot]

Notice how many times listening from a high point is mentioned that is because its best way to find out what is on the property there is no substitute for hearing them a nice cool clear morning close to start of season should tell the tell then after you locate some birds go in and learn lay of land your in lot of woods there so really doesn't make any sense to try and walk it all till you know they are there. Once you know where they roost start looking for some openings they will use for strutting. I know for new hunters its tempting to go in scouting to just see if you can call them in but I would strongly advise against it what happens is they come in and bust you without you even knowing it and why one or twice may not hurt after several times you'll end up with toms that will gobble like crazy but won't come in especially since your hunting land others are hunting there could be multiple hunters there calling with hen calls before season the calls themselves is not what makes them tough its when they come in and find what was supposed to be hen over an over

[trackerbucky]

+1 on getting up and being there EARLY and listening for birds.  And by early I mean BEFORE civil twilight. I have heard birds that gobbled for the first 20 minutes of light and then shut up for the rest of the morning.  Especially if they're with hens and they fly down early.  If you'd have been there a half hour late you'd have sworn there wasn't a bird around.

[shaman]

Let me be a bit more exact to illuminate the previous post regarding Google Earth.

If you are out scouting and  want to know EXACTLY where a turkey is, take along a lensatic compass, the kind that lets you shoot Azimuths. An $8 compass will do as well as a $50 one for these purposes.  Learn how to shoot an azimuth using your compass.  It's easy. The compass works a lot like a gunsight.  You shoot where the sound is coming from and then read the compass using the little magnifying glass.

Put Google Earth on your phone and mark the spots where you take readings.  Take at least two for each Gobbler.  Write down the azimuth readings you make.

Google Earth has a ruler function.  You can start at a known location and plot a line at a given azimuth reading.  For each azimuth reading, plot a line and then "SAVE" .  It's an option that gets seldom used in the ruler function.  Where two lines cross, that's where the bird was gobbling.  Three or more plots?  Eventually you'll describe an polygonal area. The bird will be in that area.

Google Earth makes it REALLY simple.   I'm used to old-school where I had to have a known baseline of a known distance at a known angle and then using trig functions to calculate everything.  Using that method, I could pinpoint a roost at 500 yards to within 20 yards.  Google Earth gives you about the same accuracy without trig functions.

[silvestris]

I am surprised that no one has mentioned USGS quadrangle maps.  I use Google Earth, but find it useless in heavily wooded areas with the exception of identifying timber types and clear cuts existing at the time the photo was snapped.  For the most part terrain is forever.  If you use a iPhone, I highly reccomend the "Topo Maps" app by Endecott @ $7.99.