Horse Arena Improvement

In the late fall and early spring when it tends to rain the most or when the snow melts our front horse arena, and commonly at all farms big and small, mud is a big problem.  Sometimes there simply is no more room for the water to go.  I'm sure the horses were as sick of it as I was so I decided to install drain tile in the arena sending any excess water towards a culvert.
2 weeks ago my friend Dennis brought his Bobcat over and helped my Dad and I dig ~340 ft of trench with the trencher attachment on the Bobcat.  It made easy work of it and he was a life saver.  We only ended up having to dig about 50 ft by hand in the one corner where the soil has more of a clay quality to it.  This was the only area that we got the cat stuck.  Luckily with some ingenuity and luck we were able to get it out.
All in all we laid 390 ft of corrugated plastic drain tile with holes in it to allow water to get into it and down the pipe.  We also surrounded the pipe with stone to promote drainage and prevent dirt from getting into the pipe.
I have to say so far so good.  It has rained quite heavily a number of times and has drained really well.  We even got a freak late spring snowstorm earlier this week that dumped over 8 inches of really wet concrete like snow on our property.  It melted in about 24 hrs and you'd never know it from the lack of water in the arena.
Couldn't have done this without my Dad, Dennis or his trusty Bobcat.  Thank you all!

Here is what the 2 day project looked like:

Before/During

The trencher was basically a large chainsaw for dirt!

A layer of stone down first, the pipe, then more stone and lastly re-covered with dirt.

Dennis!

The foreman (on the left)...our son Henrik, and my wife Sarah

Love this pipe POV shot!

And after...looks as if nothing happened.

The horses were so excited.  The arena has never been quite so flat.  They ran around for hours in it!