Land Clearing Services
Land clearing in Moncton and southeastern New Brunswick
Acreage, rural property, building lots and development land — cleared by an excavator-mounted mulching head, with stumps and roots removed where the end use calls for it. Fixed price, free on-site quote.
What it is
Clearing land is easy. Clearing it the right way for what comes next is the job.
Almost every land clearing quote gets one question wrong, and it's the first one: what is this ground going to be used for? The answer changes the entire method.
Land destined for pasture wants the topsoil protected and the surface left smooth enough to mow. Land destined for a foundation wants every root out and the pad compacted. Land you just want to walk through and enjoy wants the good trees left standing. Three completely different jobs, and a contractor who treats them all the same either overcharges you or leaves you with ground you can't use.
As a land clearing contractor working across Westmorland, Albert, Kent and Kings counties, that's the conversation we start with on the quote visit — before anything about price comes up.
Property types
The land clearing work we take on
Residential land clearing
Homeowners opening up a wooded yard, pushing the treeline back off the house, clearing space for a shop, a garage, a pool or a bit of lawn. Usually under an acre, usually done in a day, and usually the difference between a property you look at and one you use.
Acreage & rural land clearing
Five, ten, forty acres of woods, old field or overgrown farmland. This is where mulching really earns its money — on this scale, the cost of piling, hauling and burning debris would run past the cost of the clearing itself.
Commercial & development land clearing
Subdivisions, lot inventory, commercial pads and access roads. We work to survey lines and staked boundaries, and we'll coordinate with your surveyor, engineer or GC on sequencing so clearing doesn't hold up the rest of the schedule.
Selective clearing
Take the junk, keep the timber. Removing understory, dead stems, softwood regrowth and overcrowded growth while the mature hardwood stays. Improves the health of what's left and looks like a park instead of a cutover.
Method
Mechanical land clearing, not demolition
Our primary machine is an excavator carrying a forestry mulching head. That combination is what lets us do this without a bulldozer, a grapple, a burn pile and a week of trucking.
The boom reaches out over ground the machine never has to drive on, which matters more in this part of New Brunswick than most places — a lot of the land around here is soft, sloped, or cut up by ditches and brooks. Standing on firm footing and reaching in beats driving in and getting stuck.
- No burn permits, no burn windows, no smoke complaints
- No disposal fees and no dump trailers on your road
- Topsoil and root mat left intact
- Erosion control built in from day one
- Works on slopes and soft ground a skid steer can't hold
- One machine, one operator, one mobilization
Scope
What a land clearing job includes
Every quote spells this out in writing, so there's no argument later about what "cleared" was supposed to mean.
| You're clearing for | What the job normally includes | Also worth doing |
|---|---|---|
| Pasture or hayfield | Mulch all vegetation to grade, leave a level, mowable surface | Rock picking, a follow-up cut in year two |
| A house or building | Mulch the envelope, then grub stumps and roots out of the footprint | Grading, driveway base, septic area |
| Views & usable yard | Selective clearing, understory removed, good trees kept | Trail loop through what's left |
| Woodlot improvement | Understory and competing stems mulched, crop trees released | A management plan before you start |
| Resale or listing | Clear enough to show the shape and size of the land | A cleared access so buyers can walk it |
| Access & firebreak | Cut corridor to width, surface left drivable | Culverts and ditching at the wet spots |
Straight answers
Common questions
What's the difference between land clearing and forestry mulching?
Forestry mulching is one method of land clearing, not a different service. Land clearing is the outcome — usable ground. Mulching is the way we get there most of the time, because it's faster and leaves the site in better shape.
Where mulching alone isn't enough — a building pad, a septic field, anywhere the roots have to come out — we combine it with grubbing and excavation. Same job, two stages.
How long does it take to clear an acre?
Genuinely anywhere from half a day to three days per acre, and the spread is almost entirely about stem density and size. An acre of open hardwood with a clear understory goes quickly. An acre of ten-year-old alder and spruce regrowth, where the stems are two feet apart, takes many times longer even though the trees are smaller.
Slope, wet ground and how far the machine has to travel to reach the work all add to it. We'll give you a realistic day count with the quote.
Can you clear land without destroying the topsoil?
That's the main reason to mulch rather than push. Dozing tears the root mat out and takes the topsoil with it, and on a lot of properties around here that topsoil layer is thin and slow to replace.
Mulching cuts at or just below grade and leaves the soil profile intact, then covers it with chip. If you're planning pasture, hay, a lawn or any kind of planting afterward, this is a real difference in what you'll be working with in year two.
Do you do selective clearing, or is it all or nothing?
Selective is common and often the better call. Plenty of people want the understory and the junk stems gone while the good hardwood stays — it opens the property up, improves the growth of what's left, and looks far better than a clear-cut.
We mark out what stays before we start. Tell us on the walk-through which trees matter to you.
Will the brush grow back?
Some of it will, and anyone who says otherwise is selling something. Mulching cuts the top off but leaves the root system, so species that sucker — alder, poplar, raspberry, willow — will push new growth from the stump.
What the mulch mat buys you is a season or two of suppression. If the ground is going into pasture, lawn, hay or trail use and gets mown, grazed or driven a couple of times a year, that's the end of it. If it's left completely alone, expect to touch it up in three to five years. If you need it gone permanently, the roots have to come out — that's grubbing.
Are you insured?
Yes — general liability, and we can send the certificate to you, your general contractor or your lender before we start. If you're clearing a lot for a build, your builder will usually want it on file anyway.
Related services
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Get a fixed price on your land clearing
Free on-site quote across Moncton, Dieppe, Riverview, Shediac, Sussex, Sackville and the surrounding counties.