Tree Removal
Dead, damaged and badly sited trees taken out — including tight Queenslander access and steep gully blocks.
Learn more →What grinding actually is
A stump grinder is a machine with a toothed wheel on an arm. The wheel spins at speed and the operator sweeps it back and forth across the stump, taking off a few millimetres at a pass until the stump and the top of the root crown are reduced to chip. It is not digging. Nothing is pulled out of the ground, nothing is levered, and the surrounding soil is largely left where it is.
That is why it is the default answer for a suburban stump. It is fast, it fits through a side gate, it does not need a truck on the lawn, and it leaves a hole rather than a crater.
Why the stump should not just be left
Left in the ground, a stump does three things. It becomes a trip hazard once grass and weeds grow over it, which is the single most common way people get hurt by one. It re-shoots on species that sucker, so you end up managing a thicket where you thought you had removed a tree. And it rots, which brings fungal fruiting bodies through the surrounding lawn and draws termites and other insects into material sitting a few metres from a timber house — not a great arrangement in a city built largely of timber and tin.
None of that is urgent on day one. It is why a stump that has been there for two years is usually more annoying than the one from last month.
When grinding is the wrong tool
Grinding reduces the stump and the top of the root plate. It does not remove the lateral roots running out under the lawn, and it does not clear the ground to a depth an engineer will sign off on. If a slab, pool shell, footing, retaining wall or in-ground services are going in over the spot, you want full stump removal instead — excavation that takes the root plate out entirely. That is slower, more disruptive, needs machine access, and costs more.
For turf, garden beds, pavers, a fence line or just getting the yard back, grinding is enough.
Access and what to check first
Two things stop a job on the day. The first is buried services: irrigation, stormwater, sewer, electrical conduit, gas and telecommunications all run through suburban back yards, and a grinding wheel does not discriminate. A free Before You Dig Australia enquiry on the address is the standard precaution. The second is hidden metal — old star pickets, wire, a clothes line footing or concrete poured against the stump will chew teeth and stop work.
Point out anything you know about. It is cheaper than finding it with the machine.
Grinding after storms and after removals
Most stumps are booked at the same time as a tree removal, and that is by far the cheapest way to do it — the crew is already there. The rest come from storms, where a tree has been snapped or blown over and the emergency crew has cleared the timber but left the stump for later. Either way, there is no urgency, so it is worth waiting for a dry week rather than running a machine over a saturated lawn in February.
Indicative pricing and the factors behind it are in the cost guide. If the stump is a palm rather than a tree, the palm page explains why the job is different.
More services
Explore our other services
Tree Lopping & Pruning
Crown thinning, deadwooding and clearance pruning to Australian Standard AS 4373, not topping.
Learn more →Stump Removal
Full stump and root-plate extraction where a slab, pool or new footing is going in.
Learn more →Palm Tree Removal
Cocos, foxtail and Alexandra palms de-nutted, tidied or taken out entirely.
Learn more →Emergency & Storm Damage
Trees down on roofs, cars and fences after a summer storm — made safe first, cleaned up after.
Learn more →Land Clearing
Block clearing and vegetation management for builds, subdivisions and overgrown acreage.
Learn more →
FAQs
Frequently asked questions
How deep is a stump ground?
Typically 200 to 300 millimetres below ground level, which is enough to turf over, plant a garden bed or lay pavers. It goes deeper where something else is going in over the top, such as a concrete driveway, a footing, a pool shell or a retaining wall. Tell the operator what the area will be used for and the depth is set accordingly.
Can a stump grinder get into a back yard?
Usually. Narrow-access machines fit through a standard side gate, which is what makes grinding practical on Brisbane blocks where a full excavator never gets past the carport. What stops a machine is a locked-in courtyard with no gate, a set of stairs with no ramp, or a steep drop where the machine cannot sit level. That gets checked before the job is booked.
What happens to the wood chips?
Grinding produces a pile of chip and soil roughly twice the volume of the stump. It can be raked back into the hole and topped with soil, which is the cheapest option and settles over a few months, or it can be carted away and the hole filled with clean fill instead. Chip backfill is not suitable if you are turfing or planting straight away, because it robs nitrogen as it breaks down.
Will the tree grow back after grinding?
Not from the stump itself once the crown of the root system is cut out. Some species will push suckers from roots left in the ground for a season or two, particularly camphor laurel, Chinese elm and poinciana. Those are easy to deal with — mow or cut them as they appear and they run out of stored energy within a year.
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