How would you remove this stump?

[Craig D Peltier]

Hello, brain picking time. This is in my friends moms yard, she asked if I could remove it.
First of all its a madrona tree.Most of its gone but some is left.A turner came came an chopped out some pieces with a chainsaw.

Tree size is about 15' tall 42" (yes its big)across and the root ball is over 6 feet high. I know I can cut off roots an cut it down to the ball size.
My question is do you think I bobcat could do anything with it, or a tractor of same size with tracks and a arm bucket? Any other ideas?Is the hill too steep for those machines?
First pic is where the machine could come in at that trailer.

62198

62199

62200

Just where top part thats sliced out sunk in the ground 16 inches.So id have to lift it to cut through it or cut into dirt with a chainsaw which we all know is bad.

[Jim Becker]

That one's not a job for a small machine and the slope complicates it. Unless you are an experienced operator...well... ;) ...get out your own chainsaw and start making turning blanks one at a time!

[Joe Pelonio]

I have a 4' diameter madrona stump in the front yard, and planted shrubs around it. That wood is really hard and heavy. I suggest any cutting be done soon, before it dries out all the way. It gets harder to cut and split over time.

[James Stokes]

I had several stumps similar to that here due to the last ice storm. I called in a commercial stump grinder. He charged me $150 per stump. Took him about an hour per stump. Well worth it.

[Mike Cutler]

Strange as this may sound. Is there any chance that you have honest to god County Fairs, with oxen pulls in your area?
A matched team of Holsteins or Swiss could have that out of there. A Draft team could do the work also.
You'd have to cut it up a bit more for a sled to work it. Get it small enough and a Stoneboat could be used.
Could be worth an inquiry to your county extension agent. She/He may know of someone.

If you do find someone, have your camera ready.;)

[Craig D Peltier]

They can do that to stumps that are lying down?
I had several stumps similar to that here due to the last ice storm. I called in a commercial stump grinder. He charged me $150 per stump. Took him about an hour per stump. Well worth it.

[Roger Bell]

I have done hundreds and hundreds of these root wad jobs in various settings, utilizing cats, trac-hoes, farm tractors, light vehicles, power, hand and rope winches, draft horses and mules, power saws, burning out, various kinds of explosives and simply digging out with axes and mattocks. About a month ago I shot a huge doug fir root wad similar to but substantially larger than yours. It was on a cliff and was blocking a popular hiking trail. We sent it flying and it landed about 500' away down in a deep gorge. Since it was on a cliff, other methods weren't possible or simply weren't safe. Such fun. All these methods work. They differ only in expense, suitability for the scale of the job, and in the appropriateness for the setting.

The simplest way in your case would be to hire someone with a larger trac-hoe excavator (with a thumb) and a dump truck. Around here they charge about $100-125 per hour and maybe another $50 or so for move-in. You might also expect to pay a bit for hauling and disposal of the stump. You should expect to pay no more than perhaps $200-300 or so. Lifting the root ball is probably beyond the capability of some pee-ant small excavator or farm tractor, unless you really whittle it down big-time. I also dont believe that a stump grinder will be of much help...because we are talking about a partially attached root wad rather than a stump as such in your case.

Since this is a very small job, it may not be that easy to get a contractor to fool with it, unless you know someone in the business. If you have a lot more time than money, you can always slice and dice until you have pieces small enough to man-handle. If you go that route, consider power washing all the mud and bark and junk off the stump and roots first. Another cheap alternative is to burn it out, if that is allowed in your area. There are lots of ways to go about that method, as well.

Trim the usable wood off the stump and give away as firewood, or burn, etc. Have the trac-hoe dig out the remaining cutoff stump, then load to the dump truck and haul away. The operator can then dig out remaining roots and tidy up the site, if you wish. I would think that the operator should be be able to start and finish the work within an hour or so, depending on how tenacious the roots are. But in the end, hydraulics will win out. You could also assist the operator and cut out the residual roots at ground level with a sharp, but old chain.

[James Stokes]

They can do that to stumps that are lying down?


Yes, my stumps looked exactly like that.

[Craig D Peltier]

Roger thanks for taking the time to explain all this.

When you burn a stump do you just throw some diesel on it and lite it? Build a fire over it first?


I have done hundreds and hundreds of these root wad jobs in various settings, utilizing cats, trac-hoes, farm tractors, light vehicles, power, hand and rope winches, draft horses and mules, power saws, burning out, various kinds of explosives and simply digging out with axes and mattocks. About a month ago I shot a huge doug fir root wad similar to but substantially larger than yours. It was on a cliff and was blocking a popular hiking trail. We sent it flying and it landed about 500' away down in a deep gorge. Since it was on a cliff, other methods weren't possible or simply weren't safe. Such fun. All these methods work. They differ only in expense, suitability for the scale of the job, and in the appropriateness for the setting.

The simplest way in your case would be to hire someone with a larger trac-hoe excavator (with a thumb) and a dump truck. Around here they charge about $100-125 per hour and maybe another $50 or so for move-in. You might also expect to pay a bit for hauling and disposal of the stump. You should expect to pay no more than perhaps $200-300 or so. Lifting the root ball is probably beyond the capability of some pee-ant small excavator or farm tractor, unless you really whittle it down big-time. I also dont believe that a stump grinder will be of much help...because we are talking about a partially attached root wad rather than a stump as such in your case.

Since this is a very small job, it may not be that easy to get a contractor to fool with it, unless you know someone in the business. If you have a lot more time than money, you can always slice and dice until you have pieces small enough to man-handle. If you go that route, consider power washing all the mud and bark and junk off the stump and roots first. Another cheap alternative is to burn it out, if that is allowed in your area. There are lots of ways to go about that method, as well.

Trim the usable wood off the stump and give away as firewood, or burn, etc. Have the trac-hoe dig out the remaining cutoff stump, then load to the dump truck and haul away. The operator can then dig out remaining roots and tidy up the site, if you wish. I would think that the operator should be be able to start and finish the work within an hour or so, depending on how tenacious the roots are. But in the end, hydraulics will win out. You could also assist the operator and cut out the residual roots at ground level with a sharp, but old chain.

[David G Baker]

Craig,
If you are allowed to burn in your area, you want to start the fire "under" the stump. Dig a small pit, add some wood, add a little diesel fuel and light it up. Once the fire gets started in the stump you can accelerate the burn by adding a powered fan to keep air moving against the flame.
When I burn I have to wait until there is a good coat of snow on the ground before I can get a permit to burn. I dig a pit 4 foot deep 6 foot wide and 20 foot long with my front end loader on my tractor. I start out by adding brush to the bottom of the pit, then stack the logs and stumps on top. It takes me most of the Summer and Fall to fill the pit. When full I cover the pit with tarps and wait until the snow falls. It will take me about 6 hours to burn the pit.

[Roger Bell]

I think the method of burning described by David is a good plan if you have the resources to dig the pit. Just dousing the wad with diesel, lighting it and walking away definitely won't work. The diesel is simply the catalyst and it will burn itself out in a few minutes.

As with any fire, it is necessary to create long-burning coals if you expect full consumption of the material. You can do this with the pit method, or, as an alternative, you can pile a LOT of brush over the stump (especially if you need to dispose of brush as well) and let that brush burn down to coals. Naturally, the drier the fuel, the better the end result, but once you have the fire going good with lots of hot coals, wet brush won't matter much. You can then shovel the coals around the base of the wad. You must keep the fire burning, so that involves tending and adding fuel from time to time as the coals burn out. You can bank the fire in ashes overnight and then re-invigorate the fire the next day. I would plan on a couple of days burn for a stump of your size, tending it every few hours. Have extra fuel (brush, firewood) on hand to replentish the coals. Perhaps the neighbors can off-load their brush to contribute to your project burn.

The fan is a real good method for keeping things hot and progressing. We use huge fans for burning in the orchards around here and sometimes for logging and land-clearing slash, but a cheap box fan will do for your purposes.

If the photo comes across, there are about 50-60 average sized (10-30" diameter) stumps with attached roots beneath that brush pile that were generated by a little clearing I did with a trac-hoe on my place awhile back. The burn was done last fall. You can see from the scale how big the pile is (probably 30' diameter x 12' high). I had to use a ladder to get a diesel/gasoliine slash mix into the center of the pile. There were also several packets of aluminum gel (a napalm-like mix of powdered aluminum and gasoline) put in as boosters. The pile is just beginning to take off. I got about a 40' maximum flame height during fun part. The good looking guy in the pix is me. (Yes, the Fire Dept knows me).

http://image-hosting.hostwire.com/images/maia007/burnpile3.jpg

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Explosives will work.

So will time. Bury it in mulch and lace it with Urea or any other high nitrogen fertilizer. .

[Rich Engelhardt]

About a month ago I shot a huge doug fir root wad similar to but substantially larger than yours. It was on a cliff and was blocking a popular hiking trail. We sent it flying and it landed about 500' away down in a deep gorge.
This is OT but,,
I'd pay a resonable amount of money just to see that...
:D

[Dan Mages]

Core drill it and a stick of dynamite?? :eek: :D

Dan

[Roger Bell]

This is OT but,,
I'd pay a resonable amount of money just to see that...
:D

Problem is, you can't really watch it. You need to be at least 500' away and behind something really solid and you have to secure about a 1000' perimeter from the public. With that kind of shooting (which is really not that common anymore), there are huge amounts of fly material, once piece of which can nail you. About the best you can do is to set up a cheap video cam and leave it running.

[Rich Engelhardt]

Hello Roger,
Yeah,, I kinda figured it wouldn't be really possible.

Again,, OT - Every Spring they dynamite the mouth of the Rocky and Chagrin rivers her in Ohio to clear the ice jams. I always though a good way to raise money for some charity would be to raffle off a chance at setting off the charges.

[TYLER WOOD]

call in more turners!!!! They have chainsaws and will take just about all the free wood they can get. If you can find ya 3-4 turners it's be gone in about 30 minutes.

Turers are like termites except larger and the leave larger piles of sawdust and don't destroy most homes! Me and a couple friends of mine took out a large maple in about 3 hours with 3 chainsaws. After the first cuts were made to lay the tree down, we just gathered and went to work on it. Makes for a lovely truck bed filled with wood!!!