Something that I have thought about but never implemented is attaching a rake of sorts to the quick tach bracket on a tractor front end loader.
Something like a small landscape rake made for the 3pt hitch but instead loader brackets so it would attach to the loader. Something with a longer boom would be even better.
That would help at least get the mats out of the water without hand raking. I thought of this back in the days I had huge amounts of FA to rake out on the bank. Never did anything about it though.
