Fence Line Clearing for Farms & Ranches
Get every foot of tillable acreage back. We clear hedgerow encroachment so your tractor and combine fit through again.
Quick Answer
Get every foot of tillable acreage back. We clear hedgerow encroachment so your tractor and combine fit through again.
How many feet have you lost?
Hedgerows creep. By the time you notice, you've lost 8 to 15 feet off every field edge — and your combine takes damage every pass. We clean fence lines back to the post, leave a corridor your equipment fits through, and give you back tillable acres you can plant.
Every working farm in Southern Illinois has the same problem: the hedgerow keeps growing and the field keeps shrinking. Ten or fifteen feet off every edge, across every field, adds up fast. A quarter-mile fence line that's lost 12 feet is about 0.36 acres of corn or beans you're not planting this year — and the hedgerow will take another foot next year if you don't deal with it.
On top of the acreage loss, the encroachment scratches up your combine header, wrecks your sprayer booms, and makes every tillage pass harder than it needs to be. We've seen producers spending on equipment repairs what they'd pay for a clean fence line every two years.
Our mulcher runs along the fence and grinds the hedgerow back to the post. Clean, straight, combine-ready. We work around wire, posts, culverts, and gates without damaging them.
How We Do It
Cleared to the post
We work right up to the wire so your tractor has clearance and your fence stays visible.
Tillable acres recovered
Every foot of hedgerow we take back is a foot you can plant.
Equipment-safe
No damage to fence wire, posts, culverts, or gates. We work around them, not through them.
Mile-pricing available
Long fence lines and multi-field jobs get priced by the linear mile with volume breaks.
When landowners call us for fence line clearing
- Row-crop fields that have lost acreage to hedgerow creep
- Cattle fence lines where the brush has swallowed the wire
- Pasture fence cleanup before re-fencing or replacement
- Combine-damage prevention on wooded field edges
- Multi-year neglected fence rows being reclaimed
- Property-line cleanup for surveys or sales
- Drainage ditch fence lines clogged with brush
- Field-edge tree line cleanup while keeping wind breaks intact
How the job runs
Aerial look + linear footage
We can estimate most fence line jobs from Google Maps imagery. Send us the parcel and approximate fence length.
Walk and flag
We walk the line, flag any trees you want kept (corners, wind breaks, shade), and quote the job flat.
Clear the corridor
The mulcher runs the line and grinds the hedgerow back to the post. Wire, posts, and culverts stay intact.
Walk the finish
We walk the cleared line with you. Touch-ups are part of the job.
What it costs, and why
Fence line clearing is priced by the acre at $1,200 per acre, or by linear mile for long jobs. A typical combine-clearance corridor is 12 to 15 feet wide. A quarter-mile fence line cleared 15 feet wide works out to about 0.45 acres — roughly a $550–$800 job depending on density. Longer jobs get mile rates.
Why the equipment matters
Fence line work takes precision — the operator is running close enough to the wire to buff a post but never touch it. That's what a decade of seat time buys. The machine is a compact track loader with forestry tires and a mulcher head sized for fence line corridor work. We carry spare carbide teeth because fence lines often hide old wire in the brush that we didn't know was there.
Compared to the other ways to do this
Forestry mulcher vs. tractor with batwing
A batwing knocks the top off grass and soft saplings. It doesn't touch real hedgerow — any tree over 2 inches stays standing.
Forestry mulcher vs. bulldozer
A dozer pushes the hedgerow into a pile and strips topsoil doing it. You're left with a burn pile, a berm, and regrade work before you can plant.
Forestry mulcher vs. chainsaw crew
Chainsaw crew works a fence line at 50–100 feet per hour with a full team. A mulcher works at 300–600 feet per hour solo, and leaves mulch instead of slash.
Related Services
Forestry Mulching
One machine. One pass. No burn piles, no hauling, no torn-up soil.
Stump Grinding & Removal
Stumps of any size, ground below grade. No mower strikes, no tripping hazards.
Brush Clearing
Take back the woods edge, the ditch, the fence line, the vacant lot.
Fence Line Clearing across Southern Illinois
We bring fence line clearing to landowners across the St. Louis Metro East and Southern Illinois from our base in Patoka, IL.
Frequently Asked
Ready to Walk Your Land Again?
Send us photos and rough acreage. We come look, give you a flat quote, and put you on the schedule. Free, fast, no pressure.
Serving Southern Illinois, the St. Louis Metro East, and surrounding counties