The Biggest Stump I've Ever Tackled With A Backhoe! - John Deere 310SE Digging Huge Maple Stump

Watching this video, I'm impressed with myself. I was sixteen, in Spring of 1970. Completely by hand, I dug and chopped out a very large maple stump about half the size of yours for my elderly neighbor, Mrs. Johnson. It took me three days. I wanted to prove that I could do it. I shoveled under each root, and using an axe and a bow saw, I chopped out each root. The whole time, Mrs. Johnson complained about digging out a root in her lily bed, and that it was taking far too long. I'm not sure she was appreciating the enormity of the task. Every neighbor from the surrounding neighborhood, and member of my family (three siblings and both parents) came over to offer doubts and negativity. So I had too finish the job. I just wish I had the before-and-after pictures of my insanity.

Nice work. One piece of advise, fill you front bucket with dirt or rock to add extra counter weight. It will make a big difference in your ability to pull with out tilting the backhoe over. But you are correct no point in getting in a hurry you'll just get aggravated or break something.

I just bought 1998 John Deere 310se and it’s my pride and joy. Beautiful machine

This content was enjoyable to me. Your control of audio level editing is commendable. Please enjoy your well-deserved "Thumbs Up."

I dig them out with a JD 710 with my ex-mother-in-law standing in the loader bucket for ballast.

I’ve used a pressure washer to clean off and find the toe roots and cut them with a sawzall and then pull the stump out , you do get mighty dirty washing the dirt off though ! Thanks for sharing your World

We moved to a new home over twenty years ago, and I began removing a dozen trees, oaks and sycamores. I bought a backhoe about six or eight years ago, and tore the last of the last stumps, just this spring. I hope to never remove another tree. Thanks for sharing this, wish I could've shared mine!

As a kid I saw several stumps dynamited. It was not meant to remove the stump, only to loosen the roots. The dynamite holes are drilled from the side of the stump underneath to get the dynamite into the root area. When done right the stump can be pulled out by a team of horses.

Great job. I've worked tornado recovery and it's stunning to see trees that large blown over with their root ball flipped out of the ground. Trees are seriously connected to the ground!

It is usually better to leave the stump 5-10 feet high so you can use the stump as leverage to pull and or push the stump over. At least that is what I have found with pine trees, cause they have a big tap root in the center.

Recently, I've been working on getting an oak stump out of my neighbor's yard. It measurers 22 inches in diameter. I'm using a Chinese-made trencher I ordered last year via a catalog. It's always a good time to celebrate after pulling a big stump out of the ground. It makes me appreciate all the work the old timers did years ago to clear the big farm fields we see today. They used the ashes from burning those stumps to make soap. They would set up a tall tri-pod and a winch, then use horses to extract the stump out of the ground.

Thanks again Neil. The project is moving along, one step at a time.

When I was about 11 (around 1958-59), our County Agent came to our farm to blow five or six old Maple stumps, probably 30" plus diameter. He use an auger like that. He put up to three sticks under each stump. He used a large nail to poke a hole into a dynamite stick, inserted the blasting cap and fuse and stuffed it into the bottom of the hole. He then added whatever additional sticks/partial sticks into the hole then packed it with earth. He ran out as much fuse as he thought was needed for a 10 minute burn and split the end of the fuse cord. He sent my brother and I in the farm pickup about a 10th of a mile away then lit the fuses. The stumps went up one after the other - lots of noise - and stump chunks and rocks and dust galore. Some of the lighter chunks reached the truck. That was a fun day, except for having to pick up all that debris from the field afterward.

2 hours, fantastic. Now I want to jump on my baby 25s new Holland and go dig up something. Thanks for the stump removal tips. Big take away is go slow. Got it.

So, watching your video made me think that my dentist could’ve used a backhoe on my last tooth extraction. Lol.🥶🥶🥶

Great job. I enjoyed that you showed the search for the bucket and pins

We were fortunate to have another way to remove stumps back in the day. An old guy who did custom farm work as a young man sold all of his threshers, clover hullers, etc but kept one J. I. Case steam tractor and thresher back. Ours was one of five farms that belonged to a "threshing crew" One year we actually used the steam tractor to run an antique threshing machine. But in the winter "old Louie" would "grub" stumps using the steamer and mill chain. Links about a foot long made of one inch diameter rod and "forge" welded. The chain was too heavy to lift on to a wagon so it was moved on a stone boat and drug around a stump with another tractor. Louie would pull the slack from the chain and after one or two puffs from the steamer the stump would just jump out of the ground. If you were a 14 year old kid in the 50's it was something to see. You did a good job with your backhoe.

Great job, I’m always hogging out stumps on our property here in Idaho. I like to leave the stump about 3-4 feet longer to use as leverage as the stump starts to loosen up. We have a mini excavator (7,800lbs) and like you said it takes patience on the bigger stumps. Seems to be very satisfying work to me 😎

Thank you for your video. Brings back a lot of memories

Good job. You make me really appreciate my old shovel dozer. I just push my big trees over(when she's running) and the stumps pop up. Good Luck, Rick