Removing old tree roots

[LadyNellCardross]

Recently I had a very large spruce tree felled in my garden. It was too close to the house, blocked out loads of light and had massive knarled roots popping up everywhere in the lawn. I've decided to take out a flower bed nearby and lift some turf to create a gravelled area. However, I'm not sure how best to remove the roots before hiring a turf cutter. Some of them are quite thick so I presume the turf cutter wouldn't manage to go through them. Has anyone dealt with this before?

bumping. anyone?

What you need is a machine called a stump grinder. Some tree surgeons have them, or there are specialist stump grinding companies. It's amazing to see them in action - your problem could be solved in minutes.

Really? I have the tree surgeon coming back soon so will ask him about that. I wonder if that would just remove them from the surface of the lawn or go deeper. Thanks for the info.

As the pp said you need a stump grinder, I’d not hire one, it’s not much cheaper than hiring someone to do it. It is, I warn you, expensive,

I did four poplars by hand with a spade. Took me weeks! The key is to split and weaken them so you can pull them up like ropes.

We hired a stump grinder and my husband and the gardener had a fun afternoon removing the stump of a huge oak tree that came down a few years ago. It's a great bit of machinery!

I just had some stumps ground out. I would’t recommend attempting it yourself, it is a specialist piece of kit.

One tip: if you do ask the tree surgeon to do it (and as pp said it’s not cheap) specify how deep you would like the roots ground out to...I didn’t know this, and then ended up with shallow stumps just below the surface which pose problems for the intended hedge planting.

OP is asking about the roots rather than the stump. Get a wood saw then dig down a bit and cut the roots at about 2 feet intervals and then pull them out with force by hand.

OP, unless you can get the roots out completely, they will sprout new spruce trees.
It would be best for the tree surgeon to insert glyphosate pellets in a circle round the circumference of the cut stump, and wait long enough for them to be absorbed and kill the roots.
After that, it doesn’t matter if you just take out the big roots and miss some bits, any smaller ones left behind will be dead.

Thanks everyone for your help. It seems that anything to do with trees ends up being expensive! I will have a think about all your suggestions but I think it may end up being a job for the professionals.