Edmonton Stump Grinding & Removal

Our Service Stump Grinding & Removal

If left alone, stumps can take decades to naturally decompose. These remnants of long since removed trees aren’t just a blemish on your landscape; but they can also be a nuisance as a tripping hazard and limit your future landscape options. 

Stump grinding is a process that uses a large and powerful machine (designed to fit through most gates), to chew through the stump to about 10″ below ground. 

This reclaims the area for grass, gardens, sheds, etc. Although with larger stumps there will still be remnants below 10″, so if the plan is to plant a new tree you will have to offset it from the previous trees location.

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How Much Will It Cost?

  • One stump: $215
  • Bigger stumps: roughly $10 per inch of diameter, measured across the widest point at ground level
  • Several stumps: priced as one job, not one at a time. Two or three small ones on the same property is usually well under the single-stump price each. Full yards of stumps can be done on a day rate.

If we removed the tree, stump grinding is an optional line on the quote and usually gets done the same visit. If someone else cut the tree down and left you the stump, no problem, send a photo with something next to it for scale (a boot works) and we’ll price it.

No permit, no utility locate. Stump grinding doesn’t go deep enough to reach anything buried to code. What we do need to know about is anything shallow and homemade: old fence footings, irrigation lines, dog fences, landscape lighting wire. Metal in a stump is what wrecks a cutter wheel.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

How Stump Grinding Works

A stump grinder is basically a big spinning cutter wheel on a machine the size of a riding mower. The crew brings it through the gate (ours fit through most residential gates), sets it over the stump, and chews it down to about 10 inches below grade. The roots that spread out from the stump stay in the ground and rot away on their own. Takes about 20 minutes for an average stump.

What’s left is a pile of wood chips mixed with soil. They stay on site unless you ask us to haul them. Rake them into the hole and they’ll settle over a season, or let them sit and they make decent mulch. Once it settles you can put sod, a garden bed, a shed, or a patio right over the spot.

One thing to know: on a really big stump there will still be some wood below 10 inches. If the plan is to plant a new tree, set it off to the side of the old one by a few feet.

Grinding vs. Digging It Out

Grinding is what we do and what almost everyone should do. Twenty minutes, no hole the size of a hot tub, no dump truck, no lawn to rebuild afterward. The roots stay put and rot on their own.

Digging it out means an excavator, a crater, a trip to the landfill for a root ball that weighs as much as a car, and a yard that looks like a construction site for a season. It only makes sense when the whole area is being torn up anyway, like a new foundation, a driveway, or a full landscape redo. Builders doing infill lots pull stumps with the hoe for exactly that reason.

Chemicals and burning come up a lot. The stump-rotting products you see at the hardware store take years and mostly don’t work on our dense, cold-climate hardwoods. Burning a stump out isn’t an option inside the city, and it’s a bad idea anywhere near a fence or a garage. If you want it gone this year, grinding is the answer.

Can you leave it and plant around it? Sure, people do. Just know that aspens and poplars will keep sprouting from the roots for years, cottonwood and willow stumps will try to grow back into a tree, and anything with a big flat top will hold water and attract ants. Ornamental stumps are a thing on Pinterest. In an Edmonton backyard they’re mostly a tripping hazard.

Why Bother Grinding It?

A stump left alone takes 10 to 20 years to rot away, and the whole time it’s a tripping hazard, a mower obstacle, and a buffet for carpenter ants. Aspen and poplar stumps are worse than that: they keep sending up suckers all over the lawn for years after the tree is gone, and grinding is the only thing that stops it. Grinding also makes the spot usable again. Most people do it for a new tree, a garden bed, or just to get the lawn mowing in a straight line.

Stump Grinding Questions We Get A Lot

$215 for a single stump, about $10 per inch of diameter for the big ones, and a discount when there’s more than one on the property.

About 10 inches below ground level, enough for sod, a garden, or a shed base. Large stumps may have some wood left deeper than that.

Our grinders fit through most residential gates. If yours is narrow, send a photo and a measurement and we’ll figure it out.

Yes. Frozen ground doesn’t bother the machine, and there’s no lawn damage from the tracks. We grind stumps all year.

No. Stump grinding stays well above the depth utilities are buried. Just tell us about anything shallow you installed yourself, like sprinkler lines or a dog fence.

Better to shift it over a few feet. The old roots and leftover chips make for poor soil right in the hole. Our tree planting crew can help pick the spot and the tree.

They stay on site by default. Haul-away is an optional add-on if you’d rather have a clean hole to fill with topsoil.

Got a stump? Text a photo with your boot beside it to (780) 266-1919 and we’ll send a price.

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