Can you plant grass over a tree stump?

Question

We had a tree cut down and the stump ground, however, he didn't quite grind it "level". There is a small mound; I've covered it with dirt. Should I just plant grass over it? How much dirt should I put over it and will it be hard to mow?

Answer 1

Sounds like he didn't grind the stump down enough...if he didn't grind it down to at least afoot below ground level, then it wasn't enough. The left over tree parts will eventually rot and squish. What can you do. Sure, you can cover it and attempt to plant grass and such. I would expect that you will need to do it again in a few years. I have had stumps done correctly (deep, and I took out the ground up matter, replaced it with dirt, and it's great) and stumps done incorrectly (shallowly ground, grass tends to easily burn out, dies, ground sinks after decomposition of the rest of the tree below ground level, and it's not great).

Answer 2

You can try planting grass or you can plant something like a bush of Lilacs. When i was a little girl of about 5, my parents renovated our house to accomidate my new baby sister. When the house was finished, my mom decided that she no longer liked the huge pine tree in the backyard. She had my dad and uncle to cut it down. Because our house was on a hill, a large triangle of the stump was left. Instead of trying to remove it, my dad built a little wooden deck to lay over it and leveled it with cinder blocks under the higher end. Over the last 17 years, the stump has rotted slowly but it's still there. My only concern with planting anything over an old stump is that mushrooms may grow from the stump. This has happened to the stump under the deck and the left-over roots from the tree that used to be in the front yard before the city tore up our street. These mushrooms are most likely the poisonous kind.

Answer 3

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Answer 4

Your problem is simple and chemical in nature. You need to grind the stump down to more than 8 inches below the surface of the soil, more if possible.

You need to remove ALL, not most, of he chipped wood, sawdust, or slivers of wood - All of them.

At that point, you can refill the hole with dirt, a mixture of top soil and local dirt will be OK, and then replant.

The chemical aspect of the thing is that rotting wood uses all of the available nitrogen in the soil. Grass survives on nitrogen, so when none is there, it will grow a little, use what is there, and die. You could, of course, add nitrogen with fertilizer, but this is not the season to do that, pl us the fact that if you put too much nitrogen on a spot on your grass, that grass will get "burnt" up by it.

Attempting to burn a stump out is like P- ing up a wet rope. That takes eons and you have a smouldering chunck of wood in the yard all the time.

If the tree is small enough, y ou can dig down around it and expose the stump and ax it out, but don't cut your leg off.

Answer 5

Laugh if you like... but this works.
Get yourself a gallon of kerosene. Every day pour a little kero on the stump. Let it soak in. Once you're out of kero wait a day. Pour a very small amount of gasoline... I am talking a few drops ! On the middle of the stump. (Kero will not light well with a match in this situation, the gas will) Touch off the thing with a match. It isn't going to explode or anything, it will gradually ignite and begin to burn the stump. I did this to an old oak stump about 24 inches diameter. It burned underground for about a week. When it was done it was a pit filled with ash. I filled it an and planted over it. It Works!

Answer 6

You should be able to. Plant some that will spread and cover the stump. A lot of soil will make a hump that will be hard to mow over, It dent take much for some grasses to spread and their roots go. Or make you a flower bed place and plant something nice, or put a trellis there and plant vines. You would only need a small amount of soil over the stump to plant anything.

Answer 7

I've used a chainsaw and a circular saw to cut grooves in tree stumps before to help them rot out faster. Cut them going across in 3-4 different directions. This helps the stump hold water in the grooves, and that will rot it out faster. I did this to an apple tree 2 years ago, and now I can kick chunks of the stump loose.

It also means that if you accidentally hit it with the lawn mower, the mower may not get as damaged as if it hit a solid block of wood.

You could cover it with dirt, but you'll have a funny looking bump in the yard for years. If it's someplace that won't show, that's OK. If it's in the middle of the front yard, I'd try cutting it down more. That might mean digging around it and cutting it down more, or hiring someone to grind it out with a stump grinder.

Answer 8

You will have to be careful mowing it because if it isn't level, the blade may catch on it and you could break the blade (which can be very dangerous). But, yes, you can plant grass over it, and after a few years, it will decay enough that it is level with the rest of the yard. Depending on how large the stump is under ground, you may even end up with a hole that you will need to fill in in a few years.

Answer 9

It's really not a good idea.
The rotting wood releases bad gases (I think too much nitrogen). & promotes mushrooms. If your in a hurry you'll have to pay somebody to grind it out. If you have time there are products to help speed the decay of the stump. Then there's the old fashioned way of drilling huge holes in it & soaking with kerosine then burning it.
If you really want to bury it go at least a foot deep & make a big circle around it so the slope is mild & easy to mow over.

Answer 10

I have actually drilled stumps below the ground surface and covered with dirt and seeded grass. It worked great and the termites can eat the stump in quiet