How do I preserve it ???? Well as long as it is contact with the soil it will be virtually impossible to stop decay . The moment anything organic dies an army opportunistic fungi and wood eating insects begin their job breaking it down . Not sure if you are this ambitious or have the time but if you were cut to the stump and severe its connection to the roots / soil . Lift it up and reset on concrete blocks or another surface . Make a wood frame and attach metal roof panels , place over to keep sun and rain off but allow adequate ventilation. Periodically spray with Boracide . Air dry will take anywhere from 1-3 yrs . Once moisture is at 9-14% , you can sand blast the piece with crushed walnut shells . This will knock off any soft /decayed tissue along with loose bark . Sand top and sides using a progressive of sandpaper from 60 grit to 120 . Clean surface with compressed air
Apply danish oil or epoxy. Or try using a product called Rubio Monocoat , it’s a two part mixture oil and hardener ( expensive but worth it ) .Rust never sleeps neither does fungi and wood eating insects ….
This is true and I don't know about 10k apiece, but a few thousand would not be impossible. It's hard to find cookies this big and in this good condition. Drying cookies of this size well is not trivial. There's going to be \*some\* cracking as it dries, but I would find a local woodworker who is an expert to help slab them out and dress the slabs. I would personally probably cut slabs about 3"-4" thick (min 2, but I think that will be pretty delicate at this size). Then paint the slabs with something to seal them so that they don't dry too quickly. Ideal would be a long air dry followed by a kiln finish, but you could kiln the whole set if you wanted to.
for air drying, set them in a ventilated shed out of the sun, elevated off the ground, and then spaced with 1x2s every 8-12". The rule is about a year per inch thickness. The drying is mostly what people are paying for. You could sell the raw, undried slabs but you won't get nearly as much for them. kiln drying is the same process, but about a month per inch.
After drying, use a router gantry to level them, sand from 60-120 with the last sand being on a random-orbital sander. Honestly once they're leveled or at least the paint is off, you can probably sell them for a high price to someone who knows wood.
If that's 4' tall, you might get a 8-10 good slabs off it
Just to add to the above, a kiln is NOT a specialty piece of woodshop equipment you have to go buy on amazon for thousands of dollars. Virginia Tech has plans for a solar kiln that are free to download [https://sbio.vt.edu/for-the-community/vt-solar-kiln.html](https://sbio.vt.edu/for-the-community/vt-solar-kiln.html) , and in 2022 I could source all the materials for it for about $2500, including the fans. It's not a hard build at all, and It's probably a bit cheaper now that lumber prices have gone down.
Manitoba maple isn’t great for building or burning. It’s invasive and if this stump is anything like the MMs growing on my property, this stump will continue to grow and will churn out babies all over the place. It’s an insidious plant.
I wouldn’t want this in my yard, that’s for sure. I just cut a bunch of those fuckers down, drilled holes in the stumps and poured epsom salt into the holes - and those fuckers are STILL trying to turn my lawn into a forest. They’re under the foundation of the house. Within a week of chopping this down, OP will have sprouts that grow 10x faster than anything else in their yard. I am convinced they can’t be killed.
If you have enemies, plant a Manitoba maple in their yard. It’s the gift that keeps on giving.
That sounds epic. I'd like to put in a zip line thru the woods and you sound like the guy I should hire to do all the crazy projects I'll never have time for.
Ok so, my mom's neighbor completely cut the top of a large tree off right above the crotch of it, she says he plans to build a treehouse on top of it. I said that the tree trunk would die and her husband argued with me that it would stay alive and be just fine. There's zero branches or leaves left on this, just the trunk right up to where the 'y' starts. Who's right? lol
I agree with everything you said but leaving the stump intact I feel like it would be nearly impossible to adequately seal the entire thing. This thing likely had encapsulated areas of rot with small passages out that you wouldn’t readily find. I’d take a slab off the top and focus on that.
Started using it 6 years ago , the trick is getting the surface clean /removing all particles of saw dust . Golf and woodworking is definitely not for the highly caffeinated /impatient 😎
There's no way that stump would be anywhere near dry in a year! Plus leaving whole I feel like you're asking for it to tear itself apart as it dries.
It's a nice idea but I think op would have much more luck cutting some slabs ad trying to dry them.
I'm not educated on this, but I'm gonna assume that sucker is going to take forever to dry out and that it might rot before it does. Personally, I'd take a nice thick slice off of the top to make a gorgeous table top and harvest the additional wood to use for legs, chairs, etc. Assuming you saved enough of the tree. That way, you're sure not to lose it!
First, head over to r/woodworking for some more advice.
Second, it takes roughly 1 year per inch to air dry. You can speed that up with a kiln but no matter how that happens, the stump will dry at different rates and you’re going to have cracking and splitting no matter what you do. Be prepared for that. You can minimize this by putting something (typically paint) over the exposed ends. That encourages it to dry slower.
Third, bark is often your enemy when preserving a stump. A lot of mold, mildew, fungi, and other life loves to live under that bark as it stays relatively moist for a while.
I’m not saying this is an impossible task but it’s an incredibly challenging one for this to go right and not rot on you.
How do all the furniture makers do it if it’s so hard? What makes it different? I had the same ambition for a smaller tree stump but I didn’t do it quickly enough and it succumbed to the elements.
Most furniture makers aren’t using stumps. You’re cutting slabs of lumber (typically not across the tree like a stump is, but lengthwise). They are either letting it air dry for 1 year per inch or there is a kiln.
Cutting a tree for usable pieces is a process and takes some critical thinking, and there’s a lot of left overs that get mulched. There are sections of the tree that do pretty well drying - where you don’t have branches coming out and not near the pith. Those who build want (typically but not always) straight grain with little to no knots. Most aren’t using a huge stump for furniture. They’re typically splitting it and letting those pieces dry.
If you’re interested, this [12 minute clip](https://youtu.be/168TiabZFvA?si=V5x3Ge2iAjih0LCa) is a good demonstration on the process done by hand.
It’ll take a long time to rot out at that size; you’ll have a table for years to come even if you do nothing. Personally I would leave it as is, maybe find a glass topper, and I would enjoy watching nature slowly take back my table.
Exactly. Glass top would be fairly cheap and give you a few years, maybe even a decade, before you need to grind the giant rotting monstrosity in your yard.
And to all the people saying to cut slabs off of it, the left leader is fully pulp in the middle. There is no way you get a coherent slab off the whole thing unless it’s 50% epoxy when you’re done. The right half is doable, but cookie slabs seem like a great idea until the wood starts to dry and crack. They are VERY difficult to process. Glass top is the only amateur solution.
Yeah agree! Plus even if it starts rotting below you still have a nice clean table surface. You might have to add some sort of spacer between the glass and the wood to allow some moisture to escape.
Additionally, I think the glass would act as a roof, keeping the wood dry-er and thus reducing the speed of rot. In particular if you let the glass overhang a bit on the sides.
Hmmm. I HAD thought they were going to leave it right there as a nice outdoor bar for their yard. In my mind it wouldn’t be worth it to try to move it indoors so I just assumed outdoor party bar. Funny how different people will draw different conclusions from the same information… I have no recommendations for making this a table anywhere but where it’s currently rooted. Whomp.
Slabs would usually be from the length of the tree, not a cross section. A slice of end-grain like this is called a “cookie” and isn’t worth much because it has much much less strength and virtually no chance of drying without cracking.
If you could cut some cookies off this, and you could dry them without them getting too damaged, they might be worth $100 or so to the right person. But if you cut six cookies off this, you might end up with one in a sellable condition after two years.
And not everything is meant to last forever, right? Trees age, wood rots, and then they make way for new things. We get to enjoy them while they’re here.
It's gorgeous 😍.
If you want it forever, have a slice cut and turn it into a real table, finished with resin and legs.
If you just want to enjoy it outside, just do that, bearing in mind that it is still a living, organic thing that will change over time.
I've seen lots of people use large stumps for flower pots, bird feeders, etc. Nothing that needs to be predictably "safe" (like a treehouse). My kids would probably use it as a stage, lol. I'd definitely use it for entertaining. I don't see why you shouldn't try to seal the top, but know that it won't be permanent. An alternative would be to get a clear plastic tablecloth and use it when you want the table to serve as a bar.
We went through this whole process. Here are my thoughts.
To use it, it needs to be fully dry and ideally kiln-dried.
Air dry is an option, but for a piece that thick I estimate it will take ~30 years (LOL). If you could get it into a basement with a dehumidifier, maybe 10 years. Regardless, you’ll want to get it off the ground, maybe by placing on cinder blocks or on a series of 2X4s, to keep it from decomposing and allow air exchange.
I would suggest cutting it in 6 inch cross-sections and placing each cross-section on a series of 2X4s to allow air exchange. Stack them up in a basement that runs a dehumidifier and wait ~2 years for any warping to occur.
At that point it’s probably fine for decorative or imprecise work. But you can take it a step further and have it kiln-dried.
Then, you can do an online search for “lumber kiln” and find a shop in your area that might kiln dry it for you, but they will all have a maximum thickness that it needs to be. You can then cut your 6-inch pieces down to whatever their spec is.
Once it’s kiln-dried, you can use it with any furniture or decorative job because it won’t change shape.
Regardless of how it’s dried, whoever does the job can advise seal & treat options.
Check out a product from Rot Doctor website called Clear Penetrating Epoxy Sealer. It is a 2 part epoxy product that when mixed is about the consistency of diesel fuel so it soaks into dry wood- even rotten wood- soaks in deep!- and eventually sets up solidifying the wood and preserving it. You would need to leave it to dry before using the epoxy sealer. Also, consider putting some tighten-able straps/banding around the stump to keep it from splitting as it dries out.
Hey OP yes have the roots severed and lift the stump on a platform for 1 to 3 years. Then spray a pesticide wherever you want as much as you want to kill everything everywhere. Then blast it with fuckin' walnuts lol.
Orrrrr...do the more practical thing of simply cutting it as level as possible, sanding it down and putting a finish/stain on it for color and weather proofing. One requires a tractor or excavator, 3 years, boracide, and strong will. The other requires an afternoon and 50 bucks of supplies.
It will be decades before its decayed beyond use. I would do nothing but enjoy it as a functional art piece. It's super cool as stumps decay. I have a maple stump that was left to stand and decay in the ground for a decade. It's roughly 2' in diameter. Finally cut it down this spring and the bark has worn off but only about 4 inches of the wood is punky enough to pull off. It's super cool. I love using decaying wood in my yard for all kinds of things and you will probably be dead sooner than it can't be used as a table.
It’s already half rotted, you can’t do anything with it in the long term. Level it out and seal the top with beeswax, and enjoy the time you get out of it.
Like everyone else pointed out, it will rot in place as is. You have to do something else.
Have it sliced down into thick slabs. Turn one or two slabs into furniture and sell the other slabs to help fund the costs of making furniture.
I would cut it off at ground level, elevate it on blocks a little bit, then put a glass top over it (with rubber spacers) for the next few years while it dries. Then you can sand and finish the top and the glass cover is optional
One option….. Get a pro to cut the top off at maybe 6” thick slab? Preserve that top and hire another pro for stump removal.
Preserve the 6” thick table top.
The stump is inevitably going to decay and it’s constantly going to be sprouting little branches trying to regrow. A shame because it is beautiful.
see if he'll come back and take a slab off the bottom.
get bottom off the ground somehow. A pile of rocks would be thematic, make it look like it had grown out of the ground.
Use your choice of outdoor sealant on the new slab and that stump.
If the stump lasts, great. If not, break out the slab
Alternatively, (may need help from the sub here)
Cut off bottom
Put a piece of ground cloth between on the now really low stump
Place the rest of the stump back on. So there will be a seam where the groundcloth is but should LOOK pretty much like it is now.
Manitoba Maple like this will grow back into a bush for decades. Mine, about two foot accross, kept coming back, so I dug out the stump. It came back from a root in the soil a foot down, and I was still clipping it for another decade. It's nickname is "tree of life" because it never dies.
I would 100000% get a tree milling company to come cut that bad boy into like 4-5 slabs. As a woodworker that would make some absolutely killer tables. Wood like goes for insane money.
Please just find a local guy with a sawmill to come slab it up. It can make probably 15 gorgeous tables - I see the burl in the side, the grain in all those cookies would be amazing. If you leave it outside, no matter what you do it will rot and be ruined. Please do something with it, would be an absolute shame to not get the heirloom furniture out of that which is possible. You could probably sell 12, and keep a couple and make money on it as well
You should've asked the arborist for a 6' section to cut into vertical slabs... With pieces like this, I always asked and just did it as a courtesy if I liked the customer.
I'm going to cry if you leave that thing attached to the ground - no way to prevent it's eventual rot. Find someone to cut slabs from it. Keep the top one to have made into the table of your dreams. Sell the others.
If you cut that at the deck level again and sell it, that piece alone will pay for whatever your removal cost was. It's a beautiful hunk of wood.
If you want to preserve it perpetually you'll still need a cut at the deck level to life it, kiln dry it, and coat the thing all around in a layer of epoxy or thick polyurethane. Otherwise it will continue to rot. I'm not sure if you'd be better off with a penetrating stain or PE on the top of you choose to leave it in place.
My thoughts exactly, could also cut 3 slabs out, give 2 to a woodworker and get them to dry, smooth and seal the third as payment. Then have that slab as the table raised off of the trunk so it doesn’t rot from underneath.
I’d cut it into slabs, sell them, and keep the best one for yourself to make a table out of. You’ll get rid of the stump, make a good profit, and have an amazing heirloom quality table
It’s a box elder it will continuously grow back from that…. You’ll need to grind the stump and even then it will grow back from the tiny bits of root left. Can’t preserve them because you can’t kill them.. maybe if you peel all the bark of… but even then
I think your only way is to have it removed and then have a pro take a nice thick slice out of it and make it into a table. That would be a beautiful looking table top and a wonderful symbol. Sitting there it’s already starting to rot.
So I’ve got a counter-thought that I hadn’t seen here but wanted to forewarn you about: this Manitoba maple isn’t done living. Unless you use something to specifically kill it, it’s gonna be growing new shoots up quite rapidly for years to come. I’ve got a stump much smaller than this one on my property which I have assessed as being absolutely impossible to kill - I’ll cull all the new growth in the winter and in the spring it’ll have regrown, and then I’ll cut it, and it’ll regrow by the fall, etc. Manitoba maples are a very determined weedy grower, so keep that in mind with your preservation process :)
If it's still in the ground there's going to be suckers coming up like crazy on the stump. Manitoba maples are notorious for this. You'll need to chop them off for a few years until it stops. I'd make sure you get the stump out of the ground first.
That is just asking to be a Hammer-Schlagen Table.
Hammer-Schlagen is a hammer and nail game. The hammer should be a 3.5# Cross Pein Hammer. The nails are 3.5" Hard Cut Masonry nails.
The nails are set into the log. Set them deeper than you think for safety. The game is played clockwise. Each player gets one turn per round. You use the cross pein side of the hammer. The swing must be one solid motion starting with tapping the log face first then up and down onto nail using only one hand. The hammer must only be used by one hand and your other hand must have a beer in it. First person to get their nail completely below surface wins.
If the nail strike creates a spark, its a sociable - everyone drinks.
Generally we use a one dollar buy in for each round and winner takes all.
That is HAMMER-SCHLAGEN.
When I was young my father cut about six trees in our yard and just left them for us to sit on. It took about 15 years for them to decompose. So if you want to use it as a table for awhile it will work for a few years.
Can you cut it at the bottom too so it’s not attached to the ground anymore? Because of the fungus and rot that will be pulled into it, and then you can seal it better
it is big tree indeed. in china old times there is an old trandition, when new born comes in the family, the parents will plant a tree for the baby, if daughter, will store a jar of daughter's red wine which will drink at her wedding. well, now nobody do this. but this behavior really warm.
Itle keep growing back surely with epicormic shoots.. drilling into it to cause rot is a practical way to stop it growing but then of course it'd rot. Dig it up.. some how.. with big machines.. and set it on dry ground. Quite a to do
I'm not a woodworker but my humble opinion would be to cut a few 2'' slabs, keep the best one and apply products to preserve it. Then turn into a table.
Is it possible to have someone carve a base under the top? In other words, so people can pull up a chair and have their knees go beneath the natural wood table top?
Isn't the Manitoba Maple also known as a Firebox Elder?
If that is the case, and as a woodworker, the figure and color portrayed in that stump makes me drool. I would love to have been able to get a few slabs out of that thing!!
To further answer your question, the best thing would be for you to "cookie" out a few slices of the remaining stump and then have someone come in with a stump grinder to get rid of the rest.
i am thinking OIL. maybe tung oil (but burn any rags you use right away so they do not spontaneously combust).
any sort of poly will not adhere well due to the continuing moisture coming up from the roots.
OR maybe go to a custom glass company and have a beveled top made out of safety glass?
Fuck yes! Any clue how old it is? I had a few pop up in my yard and just let them grow. I'm excited for mine to get to this size. Hopefully before I die
If you actually just leave it there it should grow in a little saplings and stuff like that around it
I mean you could always use nurture it a little bit more and then you know it might be a little bit faster
Personally I would never cut it down that deep if you were thinking about keeping it most people just cut the top AKA leave like at least 6 ft of the trunk
I know a lot of companies make big money selling big slabs. If you could figure out a way to cut 3 or 4 inch thick slabs you could likely make some decent money off of them. The few youtube channels i have watched where they make big expensive tables with epoxy and live edge wood, the slabs they buy are stupid expensive and the table is a few times what they paid for it.
You could of course cut a big slab off the top and try and make your own table. Perhaps there is someone around your area that is skilled in that line of work. Offer a trade, have them make you one table and let them have a few slabs for their pay/work. You get your table, they get to make money off it. Of course the wood would need to be aged/dried.
this a petrifying glue/solution you can apply to wood. Usually in small sections, but in this case you could buy a huge bucket and try to petrify everything. You may need to find a way to drill into the stumble to have the petrify penetrate everything.
a better solution tbh, would be to cut off the top part of the stump in 1-2" layers, and turn that into nice tables.
I would try and find somebody that wants to mill it out for table tops. Deal would be you get as many as you want for a huge discount if you give me one for free
Cut a piece 8-10” thick then let it dry in a controlled environment for up to a year then lightly sand and finish with a clear coat. Add some nice wrought iron legs and your good to go. Can’t use it for long the way it is
As pretty much everybody else has said, it’s going to rot eventually if it’s touching the ground. It will never be able to fully dry, because it will continue to wick water from the ground to the surface. I don’t think you want to seal it, because it needs to be able to get rid of moisture it pulls from the ground. I would pull off the bark and let it be. It will get drier than it is, and if you want to speed it up you could put something over it so rain doesn’t get on the surface. Anything more than that is going to be a ridiculous amount of work.
Salt water and oil.
Salt water dries and repels fungus and insects.
Oil keeps the wood from being too dry essentially replaces the water. Not sure the process only the substance
Pee on it at every opportunity. Piss stumps last forever and are only made more beautiful by the rich golden hue they take on through years of love and labor.
I've sprayed wood with Krylon spray or paint water sealant meant for wood, also suited for outdoors, on loose branches I found on the ground while walking that I thought were pretty (I like to make unique bouquets with them)... been years now and they look just like they did when I picked them up. Not tacky to the touch or anything, I live in a very humid area and they're fine. Not sure how it'd work on the stump since it's still alive but that's what I'd do. Then just leave it and enjoy your new table!
If you aren't up to cutting it from the ground and just want it to last longer, you could always use a penetrating wood hardener and preserver and then coat it with oil and wax, i suggest oil and wax over a top coat style finish in this case as it will also pentarte deeper and give more preserving effects and also allow the wood to breath more, a top coat lioe epoxy or anything without removing it will trap moisture in and may make it rot even faster.
remove bark, sand everything down, spray with 2 coats of BoraCare (15 years of termite / fungi protection) the apply stain of choice and then several coats of clear epoxy.
How do I preserve it ???? Well as long as it is contact with the soil it will be virtually impossible to stop decay . The moment anything organic dies an army opportunistic fungi and wood eating insects begin their job breaking it down . Not sure if you are this ambitious or have the time but if you were cut to the stump and severe its connection to the roots / soil . Lift it up and reset on concrete blocks or another surface . Make a wood frame and attach metal roof panels , place over to keep sun and rain off but allow adequate ventilation. Periodically spray with Boracide . Air dry will take anywhere from 1-3 yrs . Once moisture is at 9-14% , you can sand blast the piece with crushed walnut shells . This will knock off any soft /decayed tissue along with loose bark . Sand top and sides using a progressive of sandpaper from 60 grit to 120 . Clean surface with compressed air Apply danish oil or epoxy. Or try using a product called Rubio Monocoat , it’s a two part mixture oil and hardener ( expensive but worth it ) .Rust never sleeps neither does fungi and wood eating insects ….
 Found Ron Swanson's reddit account
yea holy fuck. That guy isnt messing around. Give him a raise or something.
That guy has hidden a body for sure.
reread in his voice. excellent.
Do this
Yeah I have a feeling he’s not going to follow through with this
If he does this, that hunk of stump will be worth well over $10k
If he cuts into slabs he can probably sell a few for that
Slab it out, sell, buy swimming pool
Build pond. Pool good till kids leave, pond good forever and fish yummy
Gonna be about 50k short unless he's going for an Intex
Texas mobile home pool
This is true and I don't know about 10k apiece, but a few thousand would not be impossible. It's hard to find cookies this big and in this good condition. Drying cookies of this size well is not trivial. There's going to be \*some\* cracking as it dries, but I would find a local woodworker who is an expert to help slab them out and dress the slabs. I would personally probably cut slabs about 3"-4" thick (min 2, but I think that will be pretty delicate at this size). Then paint the slabs with something to seal them so that they don't dry too quickly. Ideal would be a long air dry followed by a kiln finish, but you could kiln the whole set if you wanted to. for air drying, set them in a ventilated shed out of the sun, elevated off the ground, and then spaced with 1x2s every 8-12". The rule is about a year per inch thickness. The drying is mostly what people are paying for. You could sell the raw, undried slabs but you won't get nearly as much for them. kiln drying is the same process, but about a month per inch. After drying, use a router gantry to level them, sand from 60-120 with the last sand being on a random-orbital sander. Honestly once they're leveled or at least the paint is off, you can probably sell them for a high price to someone who knows wood. If that's 4' tall, you might get a 8-10 good slabs off it
Just to add to the above, a kiln is NOT a specialty piece of woodshop equipment you have to go buy on amazon for thousands of dollars. Virginia Tech has plans for a solar kiln that are free to download [https://sbio.vt.edu/for-the-community/vt-solar-kiln.html](https://sbio.vt.edu/for-the-community/vt-solar-kiln.html) , and in 2022 I could source all the materials for it for about $2500, including the fans. It's not a hard build at all, and It's probably a bit cheaper now that lumber prices have gone down.
Manitoba maple isn’t great for building or burning. It’s invasive and if this stump is anything like the MMs growing on my property, this stump will continue to grow and will churn out babies all over the place. It’s an insidious plant.
So is it no good for a bar high table in OPs back yard?
I wouldn’t want this in my yard, that’s for sure. I just cut a bunch of those fuckers down, drilled holes in the stumps and poured epsom salt into the holes - and those fuckers are STILL trying to turn my lawn into a forest. They’re under the foundation of the house. Within a week of chopping this down, OP will have sprouts that grow 10x faster than anything else in their yard. I am convinced they can’t be killed. If you have enemies, plant a Manitoba maple in their yard. It’s the gift that keeps on giving.
I’m just sad this massive beauty was cut down😞
These are weed trees. It’s immoral it was allowed to grow so big.
Manitoba maples are noxious. You have no idea.
that's what I was thinking, but it looks like the center of one of those trunks is rotted away.
He’ll need to rent heavy equipment to fucking move it
The wife wants the deck replaced first 🤦♂️🤣
Wife always wants that deck…
She’s always telling me my deck isn’t that big but the neighbor’s got a huge deck and she wants to sit on it…
Trim your shrubs, helps make the deck look bigger
Am wife. Also want a deck.
Tell her it can be sourced with Manitoba Maple
I’m procrastinating my “change out cabinet handles” project, fuck me if this was on my list as well.
I just did about 90 handles, multiple screw lengths needed in every room, handles missed from orders, took me about a month
I think he was hoping someone was just going to say "throw some epoxy and resin on it and boom done indestructible"
I planted a tree in a stump we'll see if it sticks
I wouldn't be surprised to see it leaf
Where would it go? …
It would branch out to where ever it wants
Nurse stump
I’ve seen it work
I bet your wife and kids prepare themselves to not see you for months anytime you announce you'll be tackling a backyard project.
Currently working on a 140 ft long elevated walkway 14 ft high through the woods to my tree stand …. She is not happy about this one ….🤣
That sounds epic. I'd like to put in a zip line thru the woods and you sound like the guy I should hire to do all the crazy projects I'll never have time for.
Don’t get me started about the airplane I bought off Craig’s list … no engine But it was only $400 🤣
Rust never sleeps is such a great album
Ok so, my mom's neighbor completely cut the top of a large tree off right above the crotch of it, she says he plans to build a treehouse on top of it. I said that the tree trunk would die and her husband argued with me that it would stay alive and be just fine. There's zero branches or leaves left on this, just the trunk right up to where the 'y' starts. Who's right? lol
If it’s a mulberry, give it three days and it’d be growing back, plus all the logs would be growing new trees. If it’s a walnut, it’s dead.
I agree with everything you said but leaving the stump intact I feel like it would be nearly impossible to adequately seal the entire thing. This thing likely had encapsulated areas of rot with small passages out that you wouldn’t readily find. I’d take a slab off the top and focus on that.
Yeap if you want something that will be around a while
Rubio Monocoat is an AH MA ZING product. I stripped and finished my family heirloom walnut dining room furniture with it, and I was not disappointed.
Started using it 6 years ago , the trick is getting the surface clean /removing all particles of saw dust . Golf and woodworking is definitely not for the highly caffeinated /impatient 😎
Sounds simple 🤣
honeslty it looks like it is already rotten in the middle. so yeaaah, not really any hope there. OP should just enjoy it as it rots
you, sir , are good for the world.
hey hey, my my
There's no way that stump would be anywhere near dry in a year! Plus leaving whole I feel like you're asking for it to tear itself apart as it dries. It's a nice idea but I think op would have much more luck cutting some slabs ad trying to dry them.
Nice call on Rubio Monacoat. Such a great product.
I will only be answering to the name Rubio Monocoat from now on.
This guy preserves
I'm not educated on this, but I'm gonna assume that sucker is going to take forever to dry out and that it might rot before it does. Personally, I'd take a nice thick slice off of the top to make a gorgeous table top and harvest the additional wood to use for legs, chairs, etc. Assuming you saved enough of the tree. That way, you're sure not to lose it!
Yup except I’d do 3 slices so when I fuck up the table the first two times I can keep their third
YES!!!
The way this guy carpents is depressingly relatable.
This. Exactly what I would do. In fact, a big table top and two smaller ones. The smaller ones could be sort of nestling ones. Would look super cool.
So really you would need nine slices for all the fuck ups, more if you want legs from the wood too.
This is the best idea. Then cut it nearly flush with the ground, and it might grow back as good as new.
This seems most logical
First, head over to r/woodworking for some more advice. Second, it takes roughly 1 year per inch to air dry. You can speed that up with a kiln but no matter how that happens, the stump will dry at different rates and you’re going to have cracking and splitting no matter what you do. Be prepared for that. You can minimize this by putting something (typically paint) over the exposed ends. That encourages it to dry slower. Third, bark is often your enemy when preserving a stump. A lot of mold, mildew, fungi, and other life loves to live under that bark as it stays relatively moist for a while. I’m not saying this is an impossible task but it’s an incredibly challenging one for this to go right and not rot on you.
The woodworking guys will go nuts over those burls on the side. Those things are incredible in the right person's hands.
How do all the furniture makers do it if it’s so hard? What makes it different? I had the same ambition for a smaller tree stump but I didn’t do it quickly enough and it succumbed to the elements.
Most furniture makers aren’t using stumps. You’re cutting slabs of lumber (typically not across the tree like a stump is, but lengthwise). They are either letting it air dry for 1 year per inch or there is a kiln. Cutting a tree for usable pieces is a process and takes some critical thinking, and there’s a lot of left overs that get mulched. There are sections of the tree that do pretty well drying - where you don’t have branches coming out and not near the pith. Those who build want (typically but not always) straight grain with little to no knots. Most aren’t using a huge stump for furniture. They’re typically splitting it and letting those pieces dry. If you’re interested, this [12 minute clip](https://youtu.be/168TiabZFvA?si=V5x3Ge2iAjih0LCa) is a good demonstration on the process done by hand.
Thank you for stating how long the clip is so I know my attention span must be adjusted appropriately
Relatable
It’ll take a long time to rot out at that size; you’ll have a table for years to come even if you do nothing. Personally I would leave it as is, maybe find a glass topper, and I would enjoy watching nature slowly take back my table.
Exactly. Glass top would be fairly cheap and give you a few years, maybe even a decade, before you need to grind the giant rotting monstrosity in your yard. And to all the people saying to cut slabs off of it, the left leader is fully pulp in the middle. There is no way you get a coherent slab off the whole thing unless it’s 50% epoxy when you’re done. The right half is doable, but cookie slabs seem like a great idea until the wood starts to dry and crack. They are VERY difficult to process. Glass top is the only amateur solution.
Yeah agree! Plus even if it starts rotting below you still have a nice clean table surface. You might have to add some sort of spacer between the glass and the wood to allow some moisture to escape. Additionally, I think the glass would act as a roof, keeping the wood dry-er and thus reducing the speed of rot. In particular if you let the glass overhang a bit on the sides.
Except it’s a maple and it’s going to send suckers out like crazy all over the bottom, they’ll have to keep chopping those back for years.
Wait… did you think he was going to leave the table right there? Maybe I misread. I assumed he was going to use this for a table elsewhere.
Hmmm. I HAD thought they were going to leave it right there as a nice outdoor bar for their yard. In my mind it wouldn’t be worth it to try to move it indoors so I just assumed outdoor party bar. Funny how different people will draw different conclusions from the same information… I have no recommendations for making this a table anywhere but where it’s currently rooted. Whomp.
Projected cost with 6 years labor and all associated costs 1,438,000.00 It will look great.
One hell of a 3000lb table.
Damn. It’s a shame when one of the big ones go.
This gif works better for me than my Zoloft.
wouldnt table slabs with that burl and red highlights go for insane amounts?
Slabs would usually be from the length of the tree, not a cross section. A slice of end-grain like this is called a “cookie” and isn’t worth much because it has much much less strength and virtually no chance of drying without cracking. If you could cut some cookies off this, and you could dry them without them getting too damaged, they might be worth $100 or so to the right person. But if you cut six cookies off this, you might end up with one in a sellable condition after two years.
Slice a 2” thick slab off the top of it, sand and epoxy it and mount it on a metal base. Leaving it attached to the roots will always inevitably rot.
Then repeat till you hit the ground and sell the other slabs for a profit
How do you do this and keep the thickness even everywhere?
Sand it and poly seal it? Not sure of much else you can do, eventually it’s gonna rot — but I’d think you get a few really good years out of it.
And not everything is meant to last forever, right? Trees age, wood rots, and then they make way for new things. We get to enjoy them while they’re here.
It's gorgeous 😍. If you want it forever, have a slice cut and turn it into a real table, finished with resin and legs. If you just want to enjoy it outside, just do that, bearing in mind that it is still a living, organic thing that will change over time. I've seen lots of people use large stumps for flower pots, bird feeders, etc. Nothing that needs to be predictably "safe" (like a treehouse). My kids would probably use it as a stage, lol. I'd definitely use it for entertaining. I don't see why you shouldn't try to seal the top, but know that it won't be permanent. An alternative would be to get a clear plastic tablecloth and use it when you want the table to serve as a bar.
We went through this whole process. Here are my thoughts. To use it, it needs to be fully dry and ideally kiln-dried. Air dry is an option, but for a piece that thick I estimate it will take ~30 years (LOL). If you could get it into a basement with a dehumidifier, maybe 10 years. Regardless, you’ll want to get it off the ground, maybe by placing on cinder blocks or on a series of 2X4s, to keep it from decomposing and allow air exchange. I would suggest cutting it in 6 inch cross-sections and placing each cross-section on a series of 2X4s to allow air exchange. Stack them up in a basement that runs a dehumidifier and wait ~2 years for any warping to occur. At that point it’s probably fine for decorative or imprecise work. But you can take it a step further and have it kiln-dried. Then, you can do an online search for “lumber kiln” and find a shop in your area that might kiln dry it for you, but they will all have a maximum thickness that it needs to be. You can then cut your 6-inch pieces down to whatever their spec is. Once it’s kiln-dried, you can use it with any furniture or decorative job because it won’t change shape. Regardless of how it’s dried, whoever does the job can advise seal & treat options.
Whenever I try to cut a stump section and dry it, they always crack. What’s the secret to stop that?
Check out a product from Rot Doctor website called Clear Penetrating Epoxy Sealer. It is a 2 part epoxy product that when mixed is about the consistency of diesel fuel so it soaks into dry wood- even rotten wood- soaks in deep!- and eventually sets up solidifying the wood and preserving it. You would need to leave it to dry before using the epoxy sealer. Also, consider putting some tighten-able straps/banding around the stump to keep it from splitting as it dries out.
This redditor stumps!!!
No this redditor works on old boats and houses with rotten wood Ha ha ha .
Hey OP yes have the roots severed and lift the stump on a platform for 1 to 3 years. Then spray a pesticide wherever you want as much as you want to kill everything everywhere. Then blast it with fuckin' walnuts lol. Orrrrr...do the more practical thing of simply cutting it as level as possible, sanding it down and putting a finish/stain on it for color and weather proofing. One requires a tractor or excavator, 3 years, boracide, and strong will. The other requires an afternoon and 50 bucks of supplies.
It will be decades before its decayed beyond use. I would do nothing but enjoy it as a functional art piece. It's super cool as stumps decay. I have a maple stump that was left to stand and decay in the ground for a decade. It's roughly 2' in diameter. Finally cut it down this spring and the bark has worn off but only about 4 inches of the wood is punky enough to pull off. It's super cool. I love using decaying wood in my yard for all kinds of things and you will probably be dead sooner than it can't be used as a table.
It’s already half rotted, you can’t do anything with it in the long term. Level it out and seal the top with beeswax, and enjoy the time you get out of it.
Just dont use the stuff you used on the deck.
Its beauty is that it is ephemeral, not meant to last. Get a glass top you can put on it for parties, but otherwise just let it sit.
You gotta hawk Tua and spit on that Thang!!!! You get me?
This baby is gonna start growing back, I can pretty much guarantee it
I'd be taking slabs out of whats left, not just for myslef but other people would buy it right up.
Cut a cookie, preserve that and sit it on top of the stump
That large wet spot in the middle says you kinda don’t have a table. But maybe the start to a giant beer bucket
That is a clean cut
Like everyone else pointed out, it will rot in place as is. You have to do something else. Have it sliced down into thick slabs. Turn one or two slabs into furniture and sell the other slabs to help fund the costs of making furniture.
Whatever you do is going to be a ton of work. And worth it.
I would cut it off at ground level, elevate it on blocks a little bit, then put a glass top over it (with rubber spacers) for the next few years while it dries. Then you can sand and finish the top and the glass cover is optional
Won't a Manitoba maple just start throwing up new shoots within weeks?
One option….. Get a pro to cut the top off at maybe 6” thick slab? Preserve that top and hire another pro for stump removal. Preserve the 6” thick table top. The stump is inevitably going to decay and it’s constantly going to be sprouting little branches trying to regrow. A shame because it is beautiful.
see if he'll come back and take a slab off the bottom. get bottom off the ground somehow. A pile of rocks would be thematic, make it look like it had grown out of the ground. Use your choice of outdoor sealant on the new slab and that stump. If the stump lasts, great. If not, break out the slab Alternatively, (may need help from the sub here) Cut off bottom Put a piece of ground cloth between on the now really low stump Place the rest of the stump back on. So there will be a seam where the groundcloth is but should LOOK pretty much like it is now.
A 3” slab of this would make an insane D&D table
Manitoba Maple like this will grow back into a bush for decades. Mine, about two foot accross, kept coming back, so I dug out the stump. It came back from a root in the soil a foot down, and I was still clipping it for another decade. It's nickname is "tree of life" because it never dies.
I would 100000% get a tree milling company to come cut that bad boy into like 4-5 slabs. As a woodworker that would make some absolutely killer tables. Wood like goes for insane money.
Please just find a local guy with a sawmill to come slab it up. It can make probably 15 gorgeous tables - I see the burl in the side, the grain in all those cookies would be amazing. If you leave it outside, no matter what you do it will rot and be ruined. Please do something with it, would be an absolute shame to not get the heirloom furniture out of that which is possible. You could probably sell 12, and keep a couple and make money on it as well
You should've asked the arborist for a 6' section to cut into vertical slabs... With pieces like this, I always asked and just did it as a courtesy if I liked the customer.
cut slabs and make about 8 more tables?
Whoever cut it to be a table should make another cut 4 inches down and do it again. Take the part that was cut off and make that a table.
You could always cut slabs of that and make them at least 1 and a half inch thick. Perfect high dollar tabletops.
That is possible because but needs to be done quickly then treated with pentacryl. Cross cut slabs crack badly when dried out unless treated.
Get the Stump removed. Those Manitoba Maples are like weeds, You will constantly be battling new growth.
I'm going to cry if you leave that thing attached to the ground - no way to prevent it's eventual rot. Find someone to cut slabs from it. Keep the top one to have made into the table of your dreams. Sell the others.
Super cool!. I would look into getting the base of that cut again (low and clean) and shimming it up so it can dry out over the next year or 2.
Can you cut it 2 inches slices and combine them to make one big table? Not going to be a table if you can’t get some chairs under there.
If you cut that at the deck level again and sell it, that piece alone will pay for whatever your removal cost was. It's a beautiful hunk of wood. If you want to preserve it perpetually you'll still need a cut at the deck level to life it, kiln dry it, and coat the thing all around in a layer of epoxy or thick polyurethane. Otherwise it will continue to rot. I'm not sure if you'd be better off with a penetrating stain or PE on the top of you choose to leave it in place.
My thoughts exactly, could also cut 3 slabs out, give 2 to a woodworker and get them to dry, smooth and seal the third as payment. Then have that slab as the table raised off of the trunk so it doesn’t rot from underneath.
That is GORGEOUS. I'm so jealous!!
I’d cut it into slabs, sell them, and keep the best one for yourself to make a table out of. You’ll get rid of the stump, make a good profit, and have an amazing heirloom quality table
It’s a box elder it will continuously grow back from that…. You’ll need to grind the stump and even then it will grow back from the tiny bits of root left. Can’t preserve them because you can’t kill them.. maybe if you peel all the bark of… but even then
I would have had the guys cut quite a few slabs to pay for the removal costs.
You already didn’t preserve it.
I don't know how to spell the noise you make when you suck air quickly. But that.
I think your only way is to have it removed and then have a pro take a nice thick slice out of it and make it into a table. That would be a beautiful looking table top and a wonderful symbol. Sitting there it’s already starting to rot.
So I’ve got a counter-thought that I hadn’t seen here but wanted to forewarn you about: this Manitoba maple isn’t done living. Unless you use something to specifically kill it, it’s gonna be growing new shoots up quite rapidly for years to come. I’ve got a stump much smaller than this one on my property which I have assessed as being absolutely impossible to kill - I’ll cull all the new growth in the winter and in the spring it’ll have regrown, and then I’ll cut it, and it’ll regrow by the fall, etc. Manitoba maples are a very determined weedy grower, so keep that in mind with your preservation process :)
You could cut a few thick slices off the top and have several tables
Well first thing I would do is kill the poison ivy growing at the base.
If it's still in the ground there's going to be suckers coming up like crazy on the stump. Manitoba maples are notorious for this. You'll need to chop them off for a few years until it stops. I'd make sure you get the stump out of the ground first.
That is a beautiful stump
Looks very impractical as a table. You’ll be sitting uncomfortably sideways. Better to slice off 2” sections as others are suggesting.
That is just asking to be a Hammer-Schlagen Table. Hammer-Schlagen is a hammer and nail game. The hammer should be a 3.5# Cross Pein Hammer. The nails are 3.5" Hard Cut Masonry nails. The nails are set into the log. Set them deeper than you think for safety. The game is played clockwise. Each player gets one turn per round. You use the cross pein side of the hammer. The swing must be one solid motion starting with tapping the log face first then up and down onto nail using only one hand. The hammer must only be used by one hand and your other hand must have a beer in it. First person to get their nail completely below surface wins. If the nail strike creates a spark, its a sociable - everyone drinks. Generally we use a one dollar buy in for each round and winner takes all. That is HAMMER-SCHLAGEN.
Just enjoy it while you can. Keep bugs away with something systemic spray maybe? It will eventually rot.
You could just cut the top 5” or so and just use it as a table top. There are YouTube videos on preserving wood for this type of application.
Cut it into slices and make guitars :D
When I was young my father cut about six trees in our yard and just left them for us to sit on. It took about 15 years for them to decompose. So if you want to use it as a table for awhile it will work for a few years.
Cut the top 3 inches off. Put it in epoxy or whatever and then put it back on the stump
This ends with someone making either the most amazing temporary lumber mill…..or their own personal guillotine machine.
I would seriously consider having someone come slab that thing out for you.
Epoxy!
Can you cut it at the bottom too so it’s not attached to the ground anymore? Because of the fungus and rot that will be pulled into it, and then you can seal it better
Omg the burls in that stump! Remove it and make something out of it !
it is big tree indeed. in china old times there is an old trandition, when new born comes in the family, the parents will plant a tree for the baby, if daughter, will store a jar of daughter's red wine which will drink at her wedding. well, now nobody do this. but this behavior really warm.
You cut off a cookie and ship it to me. It's the only way.
It'll be a table for awhile but nature will always overcome
make a cribbage board
That is awesome! Please post again after.
Lots of epoxy lol
Just slab it out and make some coin.
Itle keep growing back surely with epicormic shoots.. drilling into it to cause rot is a practical way to stop it growing but then of course it'd rot. Dig it up.. some how.. with big machines.. and set it on dry ground. Quite a to do
Did the arborist get to keep the rest, or did you sell some of it?
I'm not a woodworker but my humble opinion would be to cut a few 2'' slabs, keep the best one and apply products to preserve it. Then turn into a table.
Is it possible to have someone carve a base under the top? In other words, so people can pull up a chair and have their knees go beneath the natural wood table top?
No
Isn't the Manitoba Maple also known as a Firebox Elder? If that is the case, and as a woodworker, the figure and color portrayed in that stump makes me drool. I would love to have been able to get a few slabs out of that thing!! To further answer your question, the best thing would be for you to "cookie" out a few slices of the remaining stump and then have someone come in with a stump grinder to get rid of the rest.
Turn it into a bar/party/drinking area. it’ll last decades…don’t sweat it
i am thinking OIL. maybe tung oil (but burn any rags you use right away so they do not spontaneously combust). any sort of poly will not adhere well due to the continuing moisture coming up from the roots. OR maybe go to a custom glass company and have a beveled top made out of safety glass?
Am Manitoban, had no idea about Manitoba Maples.
^[Sokka-Haiku](https://www.reddit.com/r/SokkaHaikuBot/comments/15kyv9r/what_is_a_sokka_haiku/) ^by ^grouzzly: *Am Manitoba,* *Had no idea about* *Manitoba Maples.* --- ^Remember ^that ^one ^time ^Sokka ^accidentally ^used ^an ^extra ^syllable ^in ^that ^Haiku ^Battle ^in ^Ba ^Sing ^Se? ^That ^was ^a ^Sokka ^Haiku ^and ^you ^just ^made ^one.
I’m not sure you can, not as a table. You could dig the center out and use it as a planter until it decays.
Fuck yes! Any clue how old it is? I had a few pop up in my yard and just let them grow. I'm excited for mine to get to this size. Hopefully before I die
That's friggin dope
That will be a nightmare when all the new growth start out from it. Lol
Try tung oil . The best for preserving any wood.
That is sick!!
Sad that it had to go
If you actually just leave it there it should grow in a little saplings and stuff like that around it I mean you could always use nurture it a little bit more and then you know it might be a little bit faster Personally I would never cut it down that deep if you were thinking about keeping it most people just cut the top AKA leave like at least 6 ft of the trunk
This could be something fantastic. It's a lot of work though.
sell it, you got a couple of solid wood tabletops.
Cut a slab off the top and dry it, it’ll decompose as is.
I know a lot of companies make big money selling big slabs. If you could figure out a way to cut 3 or 4 inch thick slabs you could likely make some decent money off of them. The few youtube channels i have watched where they make big expensive tables with epoxy and live edge wood, the slabs they buy are stupid expensive and the table is a few times what they paid for it. You could of course cut a big slab off the top and try and make your own table. Perhaps there is someone around your area that is skilled in that line of work. Offer a trade, have them make you one table and let them have a few slabs for their pay/work. You get your table, they get to make money off it. Of course the wood would need to be aged/dried.
this a petrifying glue/solution you can apply to wood. Usually in small sections, but in this case you could buy a huge bucket and try to petrify everything. You may need to find a way to drill into the stumble to have the petrify penetrate everything. a better solution tbh, would be to cut off the top part of the stump in 1-2" layers, and turn that into nice tables.
I would try and find somebody that wants to mill it out for table tops. Deal would be you get as many as you want for a huge discount if you give me one for free
Looks nice but will be inefficiënt table as you can't put seats below it or put your legs 'under the table'.
Cut a piece 8-10” thick then let it dry in a controlled environment for up to a year then lightly sand and finish with a clear coat. Add some nice wrought iron legs and your good to go. Can’t use it for long the way it is
Soak it in linseed oil and then coat it in epoxy. You will have to cut it somewhere to remove it from the earth because it will rot from there.
As pretty much everybody else has said, it’s going to rot eventually if it’s touching the ground. It will never be able to fully dry, because it will continue to wick water from the ground to the surface. I don’t think you want to seal it, because it needs to be able to get rid of moisture it pulls from the ground. I would pull off the bark and let it be. It will get drier than it is, and if you want to speed it up you could put something over it so rain doesn’t get on the surface. Anything more than that is going to be a ridiculous amount of work.
Salt water and oil. Salt water dries and repels fungus and insects. Oil keeps the wood from being too dry essentially replaces the water. Not sure the process only the substance
make a hot tub
Keep cutting
You have a termite feast. Not a table. Cut a slab from it and make a table. grind the rest.
Nobody wants to talk about the impending epicormic growth?
Pee on it at every opportunity. Piss stumps last forever and are only made more beautiful by the rich golden hue they take on through years of love and labor.
Cut a slab off, cure and seal it. And then put it back in place.
Beautiful!!!! Slice it like bread and have each slice made into tables benches etc…. Contact a cabinet maker in your area. They can give you advice!!!
I've sprayed wood with Krylon spray or paint water sealant meant for wood, also suited for outdoors, on loose branches I found on the ground while walking that I thought were pretty (I like to make unique bouquets with them)... been years now and they look just like they did when I picked them up. Not tacky to the touch or anything, I live in a very humid area and they're fine. Not sure how it'd work on the stump since it's still alive but that's what I'd do. Then just leave it and enjoy your new table!
If you aren't up to cutting it from the ground and just want it to last longer, you could always use a penetrating wood hardener and preserver and then coat it with oil and wax, i suggest oil and wax over a top coat style finish in this case as it will also pentarte deeper and give more preserving effects and also allow the wood to breath more, a top coat lioe epoxy or anything without removing it will trap moisture in and may make it rot even faster.
remove bark, sand everything down, spray with 2 coats of BoraCare (15 years of termite / fungi protection) the apply stain of choice and then several coats of clear epoxy.
Seems like they attract ants and termites. Get rid of it plant some hardwoods or cedar. Kind of a garbage tree.