This year’s record-breakingly wet winter and spring has prompted one Cambridgeshire farm to fall back on its own workshop skills to sort out drainage problems in some of its fields.

Steve Raven farms in Cambridgeshire and is also known for his Raven cultivator, which has been sold by Knight Farm Machinery for the last two or three years.

With water standing on the fields and local drainage firms fully occupied doing work for other farmers, he took to the workshop to find a way to produce a simple drainer that could do the job.

The result was a 1.2m x 14cm home-built claw attachment that fits on to the farm’s digger to create a trench 0.6-2m deep and just 125mm wide. There’s no sideways movement, says Mr Raven, and spoil is deposited either side of the trench as the claw is drawn back towards the digger. The claw was built in an afternoon using old Knight Raven subsoiler legs and it worked perfectly first try. A laser level was used to ensure he was getting the correct depths.

He also built an attachment that bolts on to his 7t dumper and acts as a funnel to ensure that stone is deposited within the trench only.

Once the trench is dug, pipe is laid in the bottom before being covered with stone. The driver is able to straddle the trench, tip the dumper and swiftly fill the trench.

This way, says Mr Raven, only the minimum amount of ground is run on. When the dumper needs to be refilled with stone it can travel up tramlines, minimising the area of ground or crop that is trampled on.

Mr Raven and his worker Richard Searle laid 3,200m of drainage pipe across 70ha up to the end of April. That meant they were able to target the wet spots caused by this year’s poor weather and had the satisfaction of seeing the results of their labours as each pipe released water into the dykes.