Dealing with trees/stumps in a *forceful* manner.

Factual Questions
1

This post was made for The Straight Dope GQ’s, period.

There are many ways to turn a big tree or stump or tree limbs into manageable pieces for hauling and dumping. Get ready to spend a little time wrapping your puny minds around this list I have made:

Cutting/shearing/splitting/wedging, prying, pushing/pulling/torqueing/twisting (multiplying force with simple machines and anchors), crushing, grinding, drilling, vibrating, chemical (acids or solvents/absorption), bacteria/mold/rot, thermal forces (hot and cold - fire with or without visible flame and smoke or liquid nitrogen), sound, pressure differentials, beavers or termites or woodpeckers, TNT/gunpowder, shotgun blasts, electrical shock, miniature repetitive flaking over days or weeks from a small toy-like apparatus, or any combination of these awesome forces I have listed.

These forces applied from: hydraulics, mechanical advantage, electricity, internal combustion, solar cells, biochemistry, chemistry, pneumatics, ect ect ect.

Using these as a starting point, I am trying to think in terms of almost magician-type strategies for easily dealing with our friends, the trees and their roots.

Go ahead, try to add to this list, I dare you.

How can I make these ideas become a reality?

Please, don’t bore me or waste my time asking “Why don’t you just do this or that?”. Chains saws suck. Stump grinding sucks, ect ect ect. Just admit it.

Sorry for my attitude, I know I am breaking your hearts… now let’s see how creative you bunch of overly educated, over-achieving, smarty-pants computer psychos are… because you are the most worthy of my consulting.

2

[announcer voice]Men, are you tired of those pesky, hard to remove stumps and blade-dulling submerged bolders? Why not use genuine Dynamit Nobel Dynamite? Nobel has the most stable and effective formulation of dynamite available on the market today. Forget those other brands from remote parts of Delaware; only use CE approved Nobel dynamite.

Nobel – better living through explosion since 1866![/announcer voice]

Stranger

3

I always heard that you can drill a series of deep holes in a stump. Then you just saturate it with something like diesel fuel over and over again until it can’t hold any more. Then, you just toss a match and it is gone after it burns out in two days.

4

Drill the deep holes, fill them with liquid oxygen, then find a way to light the stump while standing waaay back.

(Note: get a second opinion on this; I am by no means an expert on using liquid O[sub]2[/sub].)

5

Electro-Convulsive Therapy?

Damn, you really hate that stump, doncha?!

6

Very dangerous; LOx is (obviously) and extremely reactive oxidizer; spill any on your clothes or even absorb some vapor and you will be extremely flammible.

The old saw about diesel fuel/fuel oil does work but makes a noxious mess and will pollute groundwater. All joking aside, dynamite is generally the best option for stumps too large to pull with a tractor, but you have to know what you are doing, and although I’m not familiar with the current federal regulations I suspect sales and transport regs have tightened up considerably since the Oklahoma City bombing and the September 11 attacks. It used to be, though, in many Western states you just drive up to the contractor supply house, fill out a form, show your id, and walk away with a case of bangstick, no huhu.

Stranger

7

Can I just say, as a lawyer, that when it comes to making a comprehensive list, your technique sucks? You’re being waaay too specific. For example:

“TNT/gunpowder, shotgun blasts”.

Straight away there are loopholes you can drive a truck through. What about explosives other than those you specifically name? What about other sorts of firearm?

8

Cold fusion device. Keep the yield to .1 ton, preferably less.

Set a phaser on overload. Place on stump. Retreat to safe distance.

9

Time

10

When it comes to removing stumps, explosives are the bomb. Heh. Here in logging country, we had serious stumps to get rid of when we cleared the land for our fields and roads. Stumps 10 feet around were not uncommon. Dynamite just shreds these things. It’s amazing.

We also have what are called “glacial erratics”, big rocks carried down by the glaciers and left in our fields. Dynamite turns those into gravel.

Dynamite is the answer, for sure. If you can’t find any, there are probably hundreds of recipes for homemade explosives available via Google (kiddies, don’t try this at home).

I’ve personally used dynamite, the burning with diesel fuel method, chopping & grinding, drilling & decaying (only works with deciduous softwoods), and D7 Cat tractor. Dynamite beats them all, by far, for ease of use, environmental safety, and efficiency.

11

How about a small asteroid? But you’ve gotta have really good aim.

12

Problem is, dynamite is not the most community-friendly object to use because of noise and wooden projectiles, and it is illegal without a license here in South Florida. Trust me, that was my first choice too, lots of energy + short amount of time = Say goodbye to Stump or nuisance Tree.

Maybe noise cancellation equipment would solve the biggest problems with this. Pie in the sky, I know.

13

In order to use a chipper, you have to disassemble the tree. You have eliminated the most logical, useful tool, the chainsaw. That makes the job much more difficult. Are you any good with axes or bowsaws?

You could start by burning the tree, but even if the local fire fighters don’t put it out, you’ll still have a good sized charred hulk to take apart.

Some nurseries have a huge hydraulic machine that fits around a tree trunk and bites out the root ball. The truck then takes it away, leaving you with a big hole and a big fee.

You haven’t mentioned what kind of tree, how big it is, or why you want to get rid of it. That might be useful information.

14

Kids today, always sooo eager to go for the explosives. That’s why we have all those news stories about how the US is getting flabby!

You need a method that will give you a hobby, some exercise, and a reputation as the neighborhood eccentric. That’s right, I’m talking about our good friends Mr. Shovel and Mr. Beer. Put both of those bad boys to work and over the course of a couple of weekends, you can remove almost any size stump. This is especially good to do in the front yard where people drive by and see the big hole and you toiling in it for hours.

Once the stump is clear of the dirt and loose in the hole, you hook up a block an tackle and drag the stump into a clear spot in your yard that is visible from the road. Let it sit there for two or three years to dry AND to enhance your crackpot reputation. Then one brisk early winter day, you pile LOTS of kindling under it and have a huge wienie roast.

That is the ONLY way to get rid of a stump. Explosives. Pffft. Might as well not even have a stump if you’re just going to waste it like that.

15

Nuke the site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.

[d&r]

16

I can’t believe you bothered to write this post and left out somehting as simple as digging the fricken’ thing out.

You also neglected to mention the use of enzymes.

As far as ‘complete’ lists go this one rates about a 3 out of 10. You jump from extremely specific examples (shotgun blasts) to ludicrously broad (shearing).

If you are preparing a list you should stick with one level. If you want to list ‘shearing’ as category then you can summarise all possible methiods with only half a dozen additons. There’s no need to incorporate termits or beavers for example, since they are simply means of applying shearing forces. If you want to include termites and beavers as categories then stick to other speciifc categories as well.

What was the general question here?

17

Clearly you guys have never met a well-entrenched oak stump. This isn’t a pine or redwood; not even a maple or beech. These bastards can extend their roots across half an acre worth of land and be extremely time-consuming to dig out.

Sans explosive capability, I’d advise a D9 and a very heavy chain for stump removal. Once the stump is out of the ground (and you don’t want to cut/grind it up), a large bonfire should develop sufficient heat to incinerate the stump though it may take a couple of days.

Or maybe you can enlist the aid of the local Boy Scout troop to handle it for you; they seem to like sawing and cutting and so forth.

Stranger

18

Half acre root system for one tree? Umm. Yeah.

But of course it would be time consuming to dig out. You wouldn’t become known as the neighborhood crackpot if you could do it in a day! Think of the exercise! The fresh air! The admiring glances from passing movie stars!

19

I had a problem like this in my yard: a stump that would screw up my lawnmower if I ran over it.

So I took a router
http://www.woodworkersjournal.com/tte/craftsman.cfm
and ground it down a few inches below ground level, then I just put soil and sod over it.

Out of sight, out of mind.

20

If you live near the coast, I think a 16" navel shell would pretty much do the job in nothing flat. Course everything nearby by would be completely flat, but hey that’s your problem not mine.