I battled a hardened bird this morning; almost had him.
Didn't hear anything at all this morning until about 10 minutes before sunrise. I started with some quiet tree yelps on an "Able Assassin" from Foot On Da Head Game Calls. once I could see pretty clearly, still nothing. I switched to a "Trinity" from the same fella and still nothing. I went ahead and did a fly down even though turkeys around my parts don't cackle when flying down.
About 5 minutes later I heard a single gobble and I responded and was cut off. Gobble was around 75 yards away on the ground in a creek bottom. The food plot I had setup on just to get somewhere close to the creek bottom was full and thick with wheat and oats.
There was a tractor turn around that emptied into the bottom a bit so it was a slight opening that was less thick than the rest of the 10 yard buffer between the creek bottom and the food plot. After about 10 minutes, I saw him slipping in on the creek bottom side of the food plot just inside the creek line to use the cover. Not once did he gobble until he eyeballed the food plot, didn't see anything, then slipped back off deeper into the creek bottom which was really open. There he started gobbling pretty hard. He started slipping away and I called a little and he kept gobbling and walking away.
The lesson learned, is in a food plot, you better have a decoy out to keep his attention. On the other hand I have seen a gobbler come to the edge of a food plot, and slip away gobbling at the decoy because he wanted her to come to him.
I have seen this work both ways. What is the general consensus here? Should I or should I NOT have a decoy out on these late season super edumacated birds?
My experience in an open field/food plot is give'em something to look at. Your chances are always 50/50 with dekes regardless of the situation. If the terrain allowed I would have tried to work along the field side of that creek bottom and kept tabs on him with a locator and tried to get ahead of him. There is no shame in putting a sneak on a gobbler, sometimes that is your only option especially with educated turkeys. Don't give up on him, your just going to have to play a battle of whits with him. Good luck!