Ax throwing, log burling, crosscut sawing and pole climbing are a few of the events University students will compete in at the upcoming intercollegiate Association of Southern Forestry Clubs Conclave event. The University’s Forestry Club took second place in the competition last year, and in two weeks, it will travel to Alabama A&M University to compete again.

“That was the best finish we’ve had in 20 years,” said Dustin Evans, a graduate student from Macon and chairman of the University’s Forestry Club, on last year’s turnout. “We lost first place by 15 points.”

Also preparing for competition, the University’s Wildlife Society will compete in the Southeastern Wildlife Conclave competition in March. Last year, the University won first place against 17 competing schools. There were 11 events, with some that overlapped into the forestry events, such as dendrology – the identification of trees.

The University hosted the first Forestry Conclave event more than 50 years ago. For this event, undergraduate students compete in a variety of traditional physical events and technical events, such as dendrology, timber volume estimation, underhand log chopping and ax throwing, according to the University’s Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources Web site.

“It’s more of a historical competition,” Evans said. It is based on the tools they used 100 years ago, rather than the mechanical machinery used today to cut trees, he said.

This year, about 17 members of the Forestry Club will compete at Conclave. To prepare, the team practices about three times a week from 3 p.m. until dark at Whitehall Forest, a 740-acre research forest owned by the University’s Forestry school.

Joel Vinson, a junior from Forsyth, will compete in pole climbing and log burling – a contest between two opponents who try to maintain their balance on a log floating in water. There is a pond in Whitehall Forest for University competitors to practice in, Evans said.

The only injuries Vinson said he has sustained from his forestry sports are splinters during pole climbing.

Taking a class in tree identification helped prepare Michael Ransom to compete in the dendrology event, which tests students’ knowledge of tree classifications.

“Hopefully the leaves will be out,” Ransom said, a junior from Monroe. He said leaves and bark are helpful clues when identifying trees.

As for the wildlife event, 20 students in the University’s Wildlife Society will travel to Arkansas in March to compete in team competition, skill, creative talent and the quiz bowl.

“Quiz bowl is historically the biggest part,” said Will Ricks, a graduate student from Roanoke Rapids, N.C., and president of the University’s Wildlife Society.

In the quiz bowl, four-person teams from each school “compete in a head-to-head competition to answer wildlife and natural resources-related questions,” Steven Castleberry, associate professor of wildlife biology, wrote in an e-mail Thursday.

The University has won 15 of the 31 quiz bowl competitions, Castelberry wrote.

The Wildlife Conclave was started in 1972 and the University has competed every year.