And, a day earlier, same crew helps Ziehlke bag 457-pound bruiser

The day before the Nicks/Decker/ Ziehlke, etc. crew and their dogs took down Kyla Kennedy’s trophy 680-pound bear, they were part of the biggest adrenaline rush Tracy Jo Ziehlke has experienced in several years of bear hunting as she filled her long-awaited harvest tag with a 457-pound bruiser.

Ziehlke’s bear, taken on Sept. 9, also was harvested in Taylor County.

It came nine years after Ziehlke had received her last harvest tag and filled it on a 225-pound sow.

“This was a little bit different story because it was on the ground,” Ziehlke said. “It was the day before (Kyla’s). I shot this one on the ground and then Kyla did the next day. It was kinda cool to see two girls kick butt in the woods like that.”

According to Ziehlke, this hunt went pretty quick once the dogs picked up the bear’s scent off a bait pile at the start of the day.

“We let (the dogs) out on the bait and they trailed it all around Sackett Lake,” she said. “It crossed the road. We saw it cross the road. Mark Decker and I were like, ‘holy cow, that’s a really nice bear.’ He got landowner’s permission and we went in and kind of cut him off on a ridge. Mark gave me the go-ahead. The dogs were behind him and out of the way and I got to shoot him and he dropped. It was pretty exciting. It happened really, really fast.

“Mark was like pulling me into the woods,” Ziehlke added. “I was freaking out a little bit there. The adrenaline was running. To only be 12 yards away from this thing and on the ground like that was pretty intense but pretty cool. I keep saying it, I’m never going to top an experience like that. It was cool.”

The hardest part of the experience was actually getting the bear out of the woods.

“I killed him at the top of the ridge and he slid down,” Ziehlke said. “We had four huge boys trying to get it up the hill and then when they got it to the hill we finally could get a side-by-side in there to help us get it out of there.”

Typically the crew of hunters is larger, but Ziehlke said about half of the guys –– Chad Williams, Cole Ziehlke and Bob Hart -- were dealing with another treed bear, leaving Decker, Mike (Clyde) Nicks, Eric Seidl and Lucas Viergutz to haul her big bear out.

“A lot of good guys, a good hunt and great dogs,” Ziehlke said. “To have all the dogs there was even better. That’s what I love about our hunting group. Technically they’re not all my dogs in my yard, but they’re still my dogs because I’m hunting with them all the time. To see your dogs do good work like that is pretty cool.”

The bear will be turned into a three-quarter mount, courtesy of The Safari Room Taxidermy.

“I guess it was a fighting bear because when Brenda (Duvall) got it at the Safari Room, there was another bear’s tooth behind its ear stuck in its skull,” Ziehlke said. “Probably the one they got the next day.”