Land Clearing & Grubbing
Brush, trees, stumps and root mat removed — lots opened up and left clean, stable and buildable.
Land clearing and grubbing removes what's standing and what's underneath — brush, saplings, mature trees, stumps and the root mat — so a lot can be graded, farmed, fenced or built on. Clearing cuts what you see; grubbing pulls the roots that would otherwise rot and leave soft spots under a pad or drive.
- Owners opening a wooded lot for a house or barn
- Builders clearing a building envelope and staging area
- Farm and equestrian owners reclaiming overgrown fields and fence lines
- Commercial owners clearing pad, lot or utility corridors
- Brush and sapling clearing by mulcher or excavator
- Selective tree removal with trees you want kept flagged and protected
- Stump removal and grubbing of the root mat
- Chipping, on-site burning where permitted, or haul-off
- Rough grading, topsoil respread, seed and erosion control after clearing
- Step 01
Walk the lot
We walk the property with you and mark the clearing limits, the trees that stay, and where material can be staged or burned.
- Step 02
Quote the scope
A written number that states the acreage, how material is disposed of, and whether stumps are grubbed or only ground.
- Step 03
Controls first
PA One Call is placed, silt fence and the construction entrance go in, and the clearing limits get flagged before the first machine moves.
- Step 04
Clear
Brush and trees come down and are processed — mulched, chipped, burned under permit, or loaded out.
- Step 05
Grub
Stumps and root mat are pulled and the holes backfilled with clean material and compacted, not stuffed with debris.
- Step 06
Rough grade
Site shaped to drain, topsoil respread where it belongs, then seed and straw so it doesn't wash before the next trade shows up.
Light brush clearing on an acre is typically 1–2 days. A heavily wooded acre with grubbing and haul-off runs 3–7 days per acre depending on tree size and how far the material has to travel. Winter and early spring — frozen or dormant ground, no leaf canopy — are often the cleanest and cheapest time to clear.
Earth disturbance over one acre triggers a PA DEP NPDES permit handled by your engineer; smaller jobs still need county conservation district E&S compliance. Open burning is controlled by the municipality and is not allowed everywhere — we confirm before planning on it. Some townships require a tree or timber harvest permit, and riparian buffers along streams cannot be cleared without approval.
- Room for a lowboy to deliver a mulcher, dozer or excavator
- A staging area for chips, logs or burn piles
- Property lines and keep trees flagged before we mobilize
- Utilities, wells, septic fields and invisible fence marked or identified
- We do not do commercial timber harvesting or buy standing timber
- Trees over structures or power lines go to a climbing tree service — that's a different trade
- Riparian buffer and wetland vegetation cannot legally be cleared without approval, and we won't do it
- Burying stumps and debris on site is not something we'll do; it causes settlement later
We don't publish flat prices for this work because no two sites are the same, and a number pulled out of the air helps nobody. These are the factors that move a land clearing & grubbing quote up or down:
- Acreage and how dense the growth is
- Tree diameter and species — big hardwood stumps cost real time
- Whether stumps are grubbed out or just ground
- Disposal method: mulch on site, burn, chip, or haul off
- Haul distance and tipping fees if material leaves
- Slope, wet ground and access for large equipment
- Restoration level — rough grade only vs. topsoil, seed and straw
Can you leave the wood chips on site?
Usually yes, and it's the cheapest option. Mulched material spread thin breaks down and holds soil. If the area is going to be built on, the mulch has to come off the footprint first.
Do you grind stumps or dig them out?
Both — it depends on what's going there. Under a lawn, grinding is fine. Under a driveway, pad or foundation, the stump and root ball get dug out, because a rotting stump becomes a hole in two years.
Can I burn the brush instead of paying to haul it?
Sometimes. Open burning rules vary by municipality and the season, and some boroughs prohibit it outright. We check before quoting it as the disposal method.
Will clearing cause erosion problems?
It can, which is why the erosion controls go in first and we rough grade, seed and straw when we leave. Bare cleared ground left over a wet spring is how you lose your topsoil.
Land Clearing & Grubbing across the Lehigh Valley and surrounding townships: