After a tree comes down, you're left with a stump, and two ways to deal with it. Stump grinding and stump removal sound like the same thing. They're very different jobs, with different costs and different results.
What stump grinding is
Stump grinding uses a machine with a heavy cutting wheel lined with carbide teeth. The operator sweeps the wheel back and forth across the stump, chewing it into chips a little at a time, until the stump and the tops of the main roots are below the surface of the ground.
What's left is a mound of wood chips mixed with soil. The rest of the root system stays in the ground and slowly breaks down over the next several years.
Grinding is fast, relatively affordable, and doesn't tear up the yard. For most homeowners, it's the right choice.
What stump removal is
Stump removal means digging the stump, its root ball, and the major roots attached to it out of the ground, usually with an excavator. It doesn't get every root: smaller roots past the dig stay behind and break down. But it takes out far more wood than grinding.
It also leaves a large hole, disturbs a lot of soil, leaves machine tracks, and usually needs backfill and grading afterward. It takes more room to get a machine in, and it isn't a good fit right against a foundation or near buried lines.
Removal is worth it when something is going to be built, poured, or regraded where the stump is, or when you want the stump physically gone.
Which one do you need?
- Lawn, garden bed, or mulch bed: grinding.
- Planting a new tree nearby: grinding. Plant a few feet off the old spot so the new tree isn't growing into old roots and grindings.
- Fence posts or pavers in the same spot: usually grinding, done deeper and wider.
- A foundation, footing, pool, slab, or driveway: usually removal, so there's no mass of buried wood left to rot and settle. Check with your builder too.
- Many stumps on land being cleared and graded: often removal, done as part of the same machine work.
How deep is deep enough?
There isn't one right depth. It depends on what the spot is for next: lawn needs room for topsoil, while a new bed, fence posts, or a replacement tree nearby need the grind to go deeper and wider. If something is going to be built or poured there, digging the stump out may make more sense than grinding at all. Tell the crew what the spot will be used for. A good operator works to the plan, not to a single fixed depth.
What happens to the hole
Right after grinding, the grindings are usually raked back into the hole and mounded up, because they settle as they break down. That works fine under mulch or in a wooded area.
Grass doesn't grow well in straight wood chips. For a lawn, the better approach is to remove most of the grindings, fill the hole with topsoil, let it settle, and then seed or sod. Chips mixed into soil can also tie up nitrogen as they decompose, which is another reason to swap them for topsoil where you want grass.
Will the stump grow back?
Most stumps won't sprout once they're ground below grade. A few species can send up shoots from roots left in the ground. In East Tennessee, tree-of-heaven, black locust, and sweetgum are common examples. Mowing or clipping the sprouts usually takes care of it over time.
Before you schedule grinding
- Buried lines. Grinding goes below ground, so public utility lines should be marked through Tennessee 811 before work starts. Private lines aren't marked by 811, so point out irrigation, invisible dog fences, landscape lighting, and any power run to a shed or outbuilding.
- Measure the stump. Measure across the widest part at ground level. Diameter is the biggest factor in the price.
- Check the gate. If the stump is behind a fence, measure the narrowest opening the machine has to pass through.
- Take photos. One of each stump with a tape measure or shoe for scale, plus the path from the street.
Several stumps in one visit almost always cost less per stump than grinding them one at a time. Learn more about stump grinding and excavator stump removal, or send photos for a quote.
