---
title: "What Is Wood chips? Stump Grinding Glossary | Cincinnati Stump Grinding"
description: "Wood chips are the small pieces of stump and root that a grinder leaves behind in and around the hole after a stump is ground."
url: https://cincystump.multisites.ai/glossary/wood-chips
publisher: Cincinnati Stump Grinding
phone: +1-513-587-6772
quote: https://cincystump.multisites.ai/contact
---

Soil

# Wood chips

Wood chips are the small pieces of stump and root that a grinder leaves behind in and around the hole after a stump is ground.

After grinding, a pile of wood chips fills the hole and spills around it. The chips are a mix of stump wood and some soil. Iowa State Extension says most arborists will not remove this material unless it is requested, and that the hole is only filled if requested.

Crews can haul the chips away, or leave them. Some owners reuse clean chips as [mulch](https://cincystump.multisites.ai/glossary/mulch) in a bed, away from the new grass. Left in the hole, chips can hurt a lawn. Illinois Extension notes that wood mixed in the soil can tie up nitrogen, which makes grass hard to grow.

Cincinnati Stump Grinding says on Angi that its machine will reduce a stump to wood chips, and that it can haul the chips away and replace them with fresh topsoil. See [what to do with stump grindings](https://cincystump.multisites.ai/guides/what-to-do-with-stump-grindings).

[From Cincinnati Stump GrindingChip haul-away and topsoil](https://cincystump.multisites.ai/services/chip-haul-away-topsoil)

## Related terms

-   [Stump grindings](https://cincystump.multisites.ai/glossary/stump-grindings)
-   [Topsoil](https://cincystump.multisites.ai/glossary/topsoil)
-   [Mulch](https://cincystump.multisites.ai/glossary/mulch)
-   [Nitrogen tie-up](https://cincystump.multisites.ai/glossary/nitrogen-tie-up)

## Sources

1.  [Iowa State University Extension, Yard and Garden: How to Remove Tree Stumps](https://yardandgarden.extension.iastate.edu/how-to/how-remove-tree-stumps)
2.  [Angi: Cincinnati Stump Grinding](https://www.angi.com/companylist/us/ky/fort-thomas/cincinnati-stump-grinding-reviews-1.htm)
3.  [Illinois Extension, Good Growing: What to do with that tree stump?](https://extension.illinois.edu/blogs/good-growing/2025-07-18-what-do-tree-stump-guide-tree-stump-removal)