Jokes have been flying thick and fast since redclaw crayfish farmer Andrew Gosbell shared a photograph on social media after a real-life drama unfolded before his eyes.

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Listen Duration: 4 minutes 44 seconds 4 m 44 s Andrew Gosbell tells the side-splitting story of Bob's 'bulldozer' ( ABC Rural: Jennifer Nichols ) Download 2.2 MB

Against Mr Gosbell's advice, his irrepressible 88-year-old father Bob adapted one of the farm's golf carts, used to move and feed crays, into an unorthodox earthmover.

He did so by bolting a piece of wood on to the front of the buggy to level dirt around a dam.

"I saw him clamping it on and I said, 'Do you think that's a really good idea? There are machines designed to do that sort of thing'," Mr Gosbell said.

"He basically didn't take much notice of me.

"He did say, 'Look, look at this. This works fine'. And as he did the dirt caught onto the wood and bumped the accelerator to full power.

"All I saw was this guy basically hanging on for grim death as the golf buggy did a 180-degree [turn] and headed for the other pond."

Andrew Gosbell watched the golf buggy drive 19 metres underwater before grinding to a halt. ( Supplied: Andrew Gosbell )

Mr Gosbell Senior was thrown off just before it hit the water.

His worried son said his father could easily have been seriously injured, but thankfully the only thing he hurt was his pride.

"I sat there with my mouth open as I watched my investment head into the pond," Andrew Gosbell said.

"Dad was on the ground, so I went over to him and asked 'Are you okay?' And then I looked over to see the golf buggy, fully submerged, driving 19 metres to the other side of the pond."

Bob Gosbell is often caught in the act of risky business on the family's Wolvi property. ( Supplied: Photography by Bambi )

It was dark before father and son dragged the uninsured buggy out of the dam and back to the shed where they washed off the mud and crayfish it had collected.

But the drama did not end there.

"The following morning I heard this 'Pop, pop, pop' and I thought 'What is that sound?'. The dog was barking and I got up," Mr Gosbell said.

"It had actually caught fire."

They had made the mistake of not disconnecting the battery, thinking the electrics were comprehensively drowned.

Luckily the buggy was parked away from flammable material and the crayfish sorting area in the shed.

"So I ran out there, it was 4:00am, and it was four degrees that morning. All I had on was my pair of Blundstones and a pair of jocks. My lovely wife came out to help me with the torch while I fought this fire," he laughed.

"By then I was going to blacklist Dad from ever touching a golf buggy for the rest of his life!"

It was a case of laugh or cry for Mr Gosbell whose cheeky father did not remain subdued for very long.

"The following afternoon he said 'When are we going shopping for another one?' and I just had to walk away at the time," he said.

"Just thinking about the damage that just had been done."

Andrew Gosbell runs a redclaw crayfish farm and his father and mother live on the family property. ( ABC Rural: Jennifer Nichols )

But Mr Gosbell soon relented.

"He's one for never stopping work. I've bought a new buggy now and we're fitting a snorkel and an emergency scuba kit in the back for him," he joked.

But at the same time he is hugely relieved that his father did not become another statistic.

Workplace Queensland said just 3 per cent of Queenslanders work on farms, but more than 30 per cent of workplace deaths happen on them.

It is not the first time Andrew has caught his dad in the act of risky business on the property at rural Wolvi, north of Queensland's Sunshine Coast.

He was mortified when he came around a corner three years ago to find the octogenarian precariously perched on planks, laid on top of a tower of crab pots, after climbing up on a ladder to paint a gutter.

Bob Gosbell was found balanced on boards on a tower of crab pots, busily painting. ( Supplied: Andrew Gosbell )

Mr Gosbell says when he asked his father to get down, the reply was "I will when I finish".

And last year, Bob had the tip of one thumb reattached after cutting into it with an angle grinder.

Andrew Gosbell said his father told the doctor, "Just take it off so I can go back to work", confirmed by Mr Gosbell Senior.

"You can't interrupt your work," Bob Gosbell said. "I like to get things done."

"Did he tell you that on the same day he got out of hospital, within the same hour, he was back in the shed and back on the same grinder?" said daughter-in-law Bambi Gosbell.

Bob Gosbell started life as a boat builder before carving out a career in building houses and even a hotel in Papua New Guinea, where he lived with his family for 25 years.

Now he calls himself an unpaid labourer on the farm.

While it is hard to beat the 88-year-old's dry sense of humour, work ethic and bushcraft, his loving family just wants him to survive the misadventures unscathed.