Another Tag eaten

[JeffC]

Good news is I found some turkeys, bad news is I didnt find them in time. Started the morning at a WMA ive had luck on before, no turkeys at all, didnt hear anything, no sign. Headed to another, surprised to not see any vehicles, saw a single hen, made some calls hoping she had a boyfriend, nothing. Wanted to look at a area Ive never been on before, driving down road, spot strutter and 2 more red heads in back of field. Quick check of maps and they are on public, barely. Close to a house , so will have to call them away from house and back into woods. As I am turning around to go back to a parking spot, I see a big beautiful Smoky Tom with another Tom and 2 Smoky Hens, cant get pictures or even close to them, they ran off into woods, all private. Get parked , have to go down another field edge to woods, go thru woods towards other field, now I am below the Toms, they gobble on their own, set up and call, they hammer back, wait on them, they gobble again, farther away, headed towards road, call they answer but keep going towards road, now they are across road on private, but keep answering.
Moved towards them, but they are now in a yard, but a 3rd Tom now gobbles behind me, head towards him, answers calls, spot his Hens 1st, they are in very back of field laying in field sunbathing. Hens get up and start heading to wood line, he struts answers calls but wont leave his 3 Hens. Thought he was heading my way a few times, but wont commit.  They eventually head into woods, cant keep up with them , woods to open. Lot of sign, but only had a tag for this week in this zone, will try for more next season.
Did take a few pictures of the Strutter, the 2 Toms across road(had a hen) and was able to find 1 of the Smoky Hens with another strutter.

[notsure]

I've never seen a "smokey" phase turkey in the wild. That's really cool!

[JeffC]

We had 1 show up here at home back in 2016 or so, found out there were actually 2 of them, havent seen them since 2019. The Tom I saw was big, really want to see him in full strut. But he lives in a few yards, really skittish of traffic, he took off as soon as I stopped truck, but will definitely put in for more tags next year for this zone.
Found a picture of the hen we had here.

[Happy]

That's a bummer Jeff. I was really hoping you would kill a couple. But next year that smokey Gobbler might still be around and be even bigger

[Twowithone]

Great pics of the smokey phase never seen 1 myself.

[crow]

Nice pics, cool looking birds

[randy6471]

 Really cool pics Jeff. Thanks for sharing!

[GobbleNut]

Good tale and pics, Jeff. 

Some personal comments on the situation you described:  The private-land and nearby-house dilemma just seems to be getting more and more of a problem over time.  As one who has hunted a big National Forest over six decades, I have seen it go from a few scattered houses on the tracts of private land to subdivisions with houses everywhere,...and backed up against the public land such that it is almost getting to be impossible to not be hunting in someone's back yard. 

That is not a unique phenomenon to the NF's (and other public lands) I grew up hunting either.  Traveling around the country the last few years, everywhere we have been, it seems the same thing is happening.  That is further complicated by the fact that a lot of the folks that are buying property and building houses are also attracting wildlife to their properties by feeding them,...which in turn pulls wildlife off of the public lands nearby and keeps it out of the reach of hunters. 

Of course, some of that is intentional, and some of it just incidental, but the results are the same everywhere,...harder and harder to find places to hunt on public land where we are not trying to kill what a lot of other folks consider to be "their" wildlife and their "pets".  I have given up hunting MANY places I used to hunt just because of all of the above.  ...The times, they are a'changin'...unfortunately...