Typical per-acre ranges for lot and land clearing around Sedgwick County — and the factors that actually move the number.
Serving Wichita, KS & Sedgwick County
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Cost Guide
Land clearing in the Wichita area typically runs somewhere between roughly $1,500 and $6,000 per acre, and the spread is that wide because "an acre" describes the area, not the work. Light pasture with scattered brush sits at the bottom of that range. A mature Osage orange hedgerow or an old farmstead shelterbelt sits at the top, and can exceed it. The figures below are typical ranges for planning, not quotes — nobody can price this accurately without seeing the ground.
| What is growing | Typical range / acre |
|---|---|
| Light brush, tall grass, scattered saplings | $1,500 – $2,500 |
| Medium — mixed brush with trees under ~8" | $2,500 – $4,000 |
| Heavy — mature trees, dense hedgerow, shelterbelt | $4,000 – $6,000+ |
| Selective clearing (saving specified trees) | Priced by the job, not the acre |
Small jobs — a single fence line, a back corner, a quarter-acre lot — are usually priced as a job rather than by the acre, because mobilizing the equipment is a fixed cost regardless of how little ground you are clearing.
Debris disposal deserves its own thought before you take a quote at face value. Open burning in Kansas is regulated and there are seasonal restrictions — notably the spring window when burning is restricted in a number of counties to manage ozone and smoke. Whether burning is an option for your specific parcel and date is worth confirming with Sedgwick County before you assume a low disposal cost, because if burning is off the table, that debris is getting chipped or hauled and the quote changes accordingly.
This is also the most common reason two quotes for the same acre look wildly different: one contractor assumed a burn pile and the other priced haul-off. Ask which one you are looking at.
The fastest way to a real quote is a walk of the ground. What we need to see is the density and species, the trunk sizes, where a machine can get in, and what you want the cleared ground to become — because a lot going under a building has a different finish standard than pasture going back into hay. Photos from the road are enough for a rough ballpark on the phone; they are not enough to commit to a price, and any contractor who commits sight-unseen on dense ground is either padding heavily or about to ask for more later.
For planning purposes, expect roughly $1,500 to $2,500 per acre for light brush and scattered saplings, $2,500 to $4,000 for medium density with trees under about eight inches, and $4,000 to $6,000 or more for heavy growth like a mature shelterbelt or established Osage orange hedgerow. Those are typical ranges for the Wichita area, not quotes. The reason the spread is so wide is that acreage measures area while the work is driven by what is standing on it — density, species, trunk diameter, and what happens to the debris. A single acre of old hedge can genuinely cost more than three acres of light pasture brush.
Usually not — it is normally quoted as a separate line, and whether you need it depends entirely on what the ground is becoming. If you are building, running fence, planting, or putting the ground into anything that involves equipment, you want the stumps out, because a hedge stump will stop a post driver and a mower deck alike. If the ground is going back to rough pasture, you may reasonably skip it. What we would say is decide before the crew mobilizes: grinding while the equipment is already on site is significantly cheaper than bringing it back out later for a second trip.
Nine times out of ten it is debris disposal. Chipping and spreading on site, piling for a controlled burn, and hauling everything to a disposal site are three very different costs, and haul-off is often more than half the total price of a clearing job. If one quote assumed a burn pile and the other priced haul-off, they are not describing the same work. Stump grinding is the second common difference — included in one, excluded from the other. Before comparing numbers, ask each contractor specifically what happens to the wood and whether stumps are in or out.
Ready to get started? Call (316) 330-9524 for a free, no-obligation estimate anywhere in Sedgwick County.
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