Once geese establish residence in a "refuge" area, they tend to fall into predictable patterns that make filling your tag a high-percentage operation. Several factors drive goose behavior once they find a place that suits their needs. The most obvious is food. A freshly picked corn field is hard to beat. When you're hunting a feeding destination, decoys are a big plus.

Geese tend to land on the high point of a field, working their way outward from there. Remember, geese work into the wind on final approach. Set your spread so that the birds will pass over you en route to the decoys so that they don't land short and out of range.

Wind is another important consideration. With scouting, you can determine which way your local resident flock is liable to vector on any given wind. As a general rule of thumb, geese typically work out of loafing areas into the wind, but a freshly harvested grain field that lies in the opposite direction can throw this conventional wisdom right out the window.

Probably the best scouting tip for planning a grain-field hunt is to watch where geese are feeding in the evening, obtain permission to hunt, and be ready and waiting for them the following morning.

Ambient temperature and moon phase both play a role in goose behavior. If nighttime visibility is good, as is often the case during the full-moon period, the webfeet may chow down most of the night and spend most of the next day loafing. Later in the fall, exceptionally cold, clear weather will often goad these down-covered critters to sit tight all day, which results in a serious evaluation of the question: "Are we having fun yet?"

Snowy, blowy days can provide the very best field-hunting, with an old bed sheet providing enough camouflage to hide from birds that are almost suicidal in approaching your spread -- provided you keep snow off the decoys and use a white sheet rather than a green one or something with a paisley print.

Even when you believe all the variables are dialed in perfectly, chances for success aren't much more than 50/50 when you've committed time and resources to hunting a certain field. Geese may have been feeding like big dogs the night before right where you've set up. But it isn't uncommon to see them winging overhead to dine a mile or more away the following morning.

Pass-shooting a resident flock holds greater chances for success. Last-minute reconnaissance and mobility are major keys to success when pass-shooting geese that have staked out a loafing spot. As noted, geese using a particular area tend to fly out on a given vector every day. Scouting will reveal tendencies, but geese can develop a corporate mentality to fly off in another direction.