How to… remove concrete from your backyard
When we bought our home the backyard was basically entirely concrete. This was not going to work. We wanted a backyard filled with greenery, and we had a dog that had no problem peeing on the concrete and smelling up the place.
Luna, our cat, acted as foreman. (I swear thats it with the animals). She made sure Christian made the necessary progress each day.
I never expected it to be as much work as it was. (Though this turns out to be a reoccurring theme). If you have the same problem in your backyard (i.e. too much concrete, not enough soil), here are some tips and tricks we learned along the way.
You can rent a jackhammer from your local hardware store. This is certainly much easier than using a sledge hammer, but it still requires a lot of strength to control the tool.
How long it will take depends on how thick the concrete was poured. Ours took weeks to get through because it was so thickly poured.
Be careful how much concrete you put in your vehicle to take to the dump. You can break your vehicles suspension if you load it up too full. (Yikes!)
Your local city dump will likely not take construction debris. So you’ll need to find a local construction waste spot that will. A simple google search will show you the way. But make sure you add the expense into your budget.
Don’t expect to be done the project in a weekend. It takes time, (along with blood, sweat, and tears) to move concrete. But it is so worth it in the end.
For instance, this vehicle has WAAYYY too much weight in the back. Sorry, Dad, we had no idea!
After much hard work (and a couple broken shovels, and a broken wheel barrow), the yard is all cleared of concrete. (Well for the most part) Hooray!
Fun Fact about concrete: The Romans made concrete by mixing lime and volcanic rock.