Per-acre pricing, broken out by density
Acreage forestry mulching rates
| Density | What that looks like | Price per acre |
|---|
| Light | Grass, weeds, saplings under 3 inches | $650-$950 |
| Medium | Mixed brush and hardwoods, 3 to 8 inches | $1,150-$1,650 |
| Heavy | Dense pine and hardwood mix, 8 to 16 inches, vine-choked | $1,900-$2,750 |
A 5-acre pasture reverting to brush with saplings under 3 inches prices out around $3,250 to $4,750 total. A 5-acre tract of dense mixed timber with vines pushes toward $9,500 to $13,750. We walk enough of the tract, or review your photos and drone footage, to price it as one job and put the number in writing before we mobilize a machine.
One fact, not an adjective: one mulching head does the felling and the grinding in the same pass. No dozer piles, no separate burn pile, no bulldozer scars across your topsoil the way pushing brush into windrows leaves behind.
How an acreage job runs
- Send acreage and a rough sketch. A property line sketch, a screenshot from the county appraisal district map, or a walked GPS track works for a first estimate.
- Density check. We ask what's growing, mostly brush and saplings, or full stands of mature pine and hardwood, so the quote lands in the right tier before we ever drive out.
- Site walk on larger tracts. Anything over 3 or 4 acres gets a walk-through so we can flag wet spots, keeper trees, and any fence lines or easements to work around.
- Written per-acre quote. One number per acre, plus mobilization, before equipment shows up.
- Mulching in strips. The machine works the tract in overlapping strips, grinding brush and timber into mulch as it goes rather than pushing it into piles.
- Keeper trees flagged first. Any oak, pecan, or other tree you want left standing gets flagged with tape before the machine starts, and the operator works around it.
- Final walk and invoice. We walk the cleared acreage with you, or send video, and invoice on completion.
What makes an acreage job harder
Bottomland and standing water. Tracts closer to the Trinity River bottoms and the Trinity River National Wildlife Refuge units hold water longer after a rain than higher ground near town. A tract that looks dry on a Tuesday can have standing water by Thursday after a front comes through, and we won't run heavy equipment through mud that's going to rut the property.
Fire ant mounds hidden in tall grass. Overgrown pasture in this part of Texas hides fire ant mounds that a mower or mulcher head can hit blind. We slow down in tall grass sections and expect the occasional mound, it's part of the job, not a surprise fee.
Unmarked property corners. On acreage without a recent survey or visible corner stakes, we clear to the fence line or the boundary you point out and stop there. We don't push onto a neighbor's brush to make a job look cleaner.
Burn ban restrictions. When Liberty County has an active burn ban, burning cleared debris outdoors is a Class C misdemeanor with fines up to $500. Since we mulch instead of pile-and-burn, this almost never affects our jobs, but if you're planning to burn anything yourself afterward, check the county's burn ban status first.
How long an acreage job takes
Expect 2 to 5 acres cleared per day per machine, depending on density. A 3-acre light-brush tract is usually a one-day job. A 10-acre tract of heavy mixed timber can run 3 to 4 working days. We give you a day count with the quote, not just a price.
One limit worth knowing: we don't clear standing merchantable timber for resale value, this is brush and site-prep work, not a logging operation. If you've got a stand of pine worth selling as timber, that's a different conversation before we ever bring a mulcher out.
Acreage we clear most, Cleveland to Tarkington
Acreage jobs cluster around the same corridor as our lot work: US-59/I-69 frontage tracts near Cleveland, back acreage off FM 1010 toward Plum Grove and Splendora, and larger family tracts up toward Shepherd and the Tarkington community, where properties run bigger and border the Trinity River bottoms and Tarkington Bayou. Land closer to the river tends to run denser with hardwood bottomland species, while tracts on the higher ground near town lean more toward pine and pasture brush, which is one reason two 5-acre tracts ten miles apart can land in completely different price tiers.