I brought in the pros today to grind 19 stumps. Cost $600. They knocked it out in an hour and ten minutes.







This big machine kicks ass and takes names. The guy works it with a remote control, like playing a video game.



The guy said this machine has 74 horsepower. Diesel powered.
He said the machine cost $85,000.

I have used a vermeer stump grinder for work in the past, though not one as top end as that shown. Vermeer is good kit.

I have also operated the Mexican Stump Grinder many times.

That is a nice unit.

Tell us about a Mexican stump grinder please.

This spring I rented a Toto grinder. It worked like that one but it's smaller and the fee was $65/hr.
I worked great until I tried to use it on some newly cut poplar stumps. They were so wet that the grinder just slowly chewed them to mush. It took 5x longer than dry stumps.

I use tnt to erase the stumps and it is a lot of fun

Use a mattock and shovel to dig around the base of the tree into the ground a few inches to the extent that the root system allows. Use an axe to cut/knock off the dirty bark at that level, leaving only clean wood. Cut that sucker off below ground level and then rake the dirt over the top of it all.



My grandpa used to do that. Actually used dynamite on stumps and in the gravel pit.

My property is 48 acres of North Carolina mountain, I live on the top. Back in 1905 the local guys cleared all this land on top, right here where the stump grinder was working today, and grew corn here. Probably, 10 acres total cleared on top.
I wonder how those guys cleared all those giant stumps a hundred years ago.

Mostly they let them dry for a year and burned them.

I had a few removed by the tree fellows when they were in town, I spoke to the boss and they whipped around after work and ground them for $50 (beer money).

The beer economy is alive and well in Australia.

I’ve got a hollow cherry stump. It’s a year old now. Soaked it in diesel and oil, stuffed it with paper and twigs. Burned for about two hours. Still hard as a damn rock. I don’t know how long it’s going to take to rot but I’m ready for dynamite!

I did them up and use an axe or tree trimmers, sometimes a chain saw to cut the Stump and roots a foot or so under ground....

It’s Free !!

Try this: drill a 1” hole in side of stump near ground at downward angle. Put piece of red hot lit charcoal in hole, maybe add a couple unlit pieces too. Put a small fan on it, and leave it there. I would use hair dryer on low with cold shot button depressed so not using heat coil, just cool air. Once it gets going it stays stoked from the fan. Please try this and let me know if it works. 😁

I've got a cherry stump in my yard I tried that with 10 years ago. It's still there. I just cut it low enough to mow over it. I'm sure it will be there long after I'm gone.

I just got one done yesterday myself. The stump grinder looked just like the O.P.'s. It was a bald cypress that I dropped last summer against the neigbor's fence and between my garage and house. It was 55' tall and 23" dbh. Stump on the other hand was about 4' X 6' and the edge of it was under the neighbor's fence and enveloped a post.

When I lived in TN, I had a big black locust stump and about a dozen smaller stumps in my yard that I mowed around for 7 years. The black locust I doused in oil numerous times over the years and lit on fire from time to time. Never did burn it out, in fact barely put a dent in it, let alone rotting out. Just before I put the property up for sale, I hired a guy I knew with a stump grinder for $100 and cleaned all that up in about 1/2 an hour. Kicked myself in the butt for not doing that 7 years sooner.

At my current house, I dug up two decent sized stumps myself a few years ago. One took 1/2 day, the other about 3 days. Decided I was NOT going to spend weeks digging and cutting up this bald cypress stump. Talked to the neighbor, took the fence sections down, stump guy finished in about 15 minutes including two sections of roots that were about 1' X 6', I put the fence sections back up and cleaned up the mess. Took me about 3-4 hours. Cost me $200, but it was well worth it for the amount of labor I would have had in it.

"Stumpbuster" was the original farmers mix of diesel and fertilizer. Wasn't it?
Before Hollywood got a hold of it?

I just had about 25 ash trees taken down due to the bugs,made a barter with a guy he took the wood and on his end grind the stumps,been almost 3 months and he's not come back to grind. Hmmmm
Think I got screwed,,,oh well,been following this along as now I need to rent one from HD I guess., (never seems to work when I barter)

Oh yeah,,hit one of the stumps with my mower and took out a spindle,,good times

Two weeks ago I rented a stump grinder. This is a big bad machine with two big rubber wheels. It has 2 wheel drive. You have to swing it back and forth, up and down, by hand.
I have used this same machine to grind 20 stumps several years ago and it worked great. But that was on flat land.

So now, I had to grind stumps on this little hill. I ground the first stump, and then went straight downhill to get another one 3 feet away.
But, the wheels were in the sawdust from the first stump.
The heavy machine got stuck in that sawdust and wouldn't back up. I could not manipulate the machine and finish the second stump. I had to go forward, down off the little hill. I realized that this machine was very difficult to work on a hill. I put it back in the pickup and returned it to the rental place. The rental was supposed to cost $195 for the day, but the rental guys told me that machine doesn't work well on hills, they charged me only $35.











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This is the same stump that I couldn't get with the rental machine. This big machine with the tracks just ate the stump up in about one minute. It worked well on the hill.
The rental place is 30 miles from my house. So, I spent 2 hours driving, car costs for driving 120 miles, and a total of 5 hours, plus $35 on rental costs, in order to grind one and a half stumps.

The pros made a killing, they worked for an hour and ten minutes for $600. But, the stumps are gone!
Eight of these stumps were locust. I thought about attacking them with the chain saw, I could just see myself destroying several chains and working real hard for a small result. It was time to call in the pros.

I have always heard if you burn them it prevents rot. 20 years ago We had an ice storm and I cut all the pine trees in my yard. I sawed them off at or below ground level. A stump grinder would have been more fun.

It’s funny sometimes how we will spend hours of labor to save $200 but not blink at spending $1000 on a gun in minutes.
Just part of being a grown man I suppose.

I had a guy come out years ago, did them for 25 bucks a stump.

Priorities play a big part.

Sounds like you got a better deal. By five stumps ignoring inflation.


How long ago?

+1. Agree

I just had 15 trees dropped and the stumps ground to clear out for a building . A few were big cedars . I have about 5 yards of cedar mulch from the stumps .

$600 was a good deal .

I've been cutting trees on my place for 3 years. It would be nice to have a stump grinder handy but I just cut the stumps flush with the ground with a chainsaw. It's hard on the chains because it's impossible to do so without getting the chain in the dirt. But I've gotten very good at sharpening chains.

This was a lot more work than i realized, pictures dont do it justice the stumps were 2 foot poplar and the root balls were massive i couldn't pull them out of the hole so I dug even deeper and rolled them in. Reversed the bucket to scoop out underneath the stump

Dig them out a ways, knock off the bark with an axe, and you avoid 90% of the dirt that dulls the chain. Even if you don't dig into the ground, still knock the bark off down near the ground before sawing. Makes a big difference.

That’s basically what I do with a shovel, axe and chainsaw.

once I have the roots cut off I use a hose to wash the dirt off the stump, then I cut it into quarters from the top with a chainsaw, and split it into 4 pieces using with wedges