October 2, 2026
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A total of 71,330 visitors came through the gates of the Bruce County International Plowing Match and Rural Expo (IPM), held Sept. 22-26, on the property of Tony and Elaine Lang, west Walkerton. This was a few thousand short of the 100,000 expected even though it was sunny and warm throughout the five-day event.
Attendance grew every day, culminating in a crowd of 18,670 on Saturday — the busiest day of the week, states a press release, issued Wednesday by the local IPM committee.
For the committee, the final numbers are particularly meaningful after years of planning and an extraordinary community effort involving more than 1,700 volunteers.
“We dreamed big from the beginning, and our community stepped up in an extraordinary way,” said committee chairman Gord Lang. “To welcome more than 71,000 people to Bruce County and record the largest attendance the IPM has seen since the COVID-19 pandemic is something our entire community can be incredibly proud of.
“We set an ambitious target and thousands of people chose to spend part of their week with us and see, first hand, what Bruce County had to offer. What a tremendous success.”
At the heart of that achievement were the more than 1,700 local and provincial volunteers who helped build, operate and support virtually every aspect of the massive event. For two years leading up to the match, volunteers served on committees, developed programs, recruited sponsors and exhibitors, prepared the site and worked through the thousands of details required to transform farmland into a temporary city capable of welcoming tens of thousands of people. During match week, they were everywhere.
“Our volunteers were the heart and soul of the 2026 IPM,” said Lang. “They welcomed visitors, drove shuttles, directed traffic, served meals, supported our competitors and exhibitors, answered questions and solved countless problems behind the scenes. More than 1,700 people gave their time and talents to make this happen. This success belongs to them.”
The 107th IPM transformed farmland outside Walkerton into a five-day showcase of agriculture, rural life and community. Visitors experienced competitive tractor-plowing and horse-plowing, agricultural exhibits and demonstrations, hundreds of vendors and exhibitors, live entertainment, parades, educational programming and special events.
Competition remained at the heart of the Match, with plowmen and plowwomen from Ontario, the United States, Belgium and Ireland competing throughout the week. Six Ontario competitors also earned the right to represent the province at the 2027 Canadian Plowing Championships:
Junior Champion Dugald McIntosh of Seaforth
Reserve Junior Champion Brendan Hickey of Auburn
Tractor (Conventional) Champion Brian Davenport of Owen Sound
Tractor (Conventional) Reserve Champion Mark Varkaamp of Hagersville
Tractor (Reversible) Champion Tom Evans of Tiverton
Tractor (Reversible) Reserve Champion Robert Sterling of Chatham
The match also saw Carmen Ward of Grey Normanby crowned the 2026-27 Ontario Queen of the Furrow, while Saturday provided an encouraging glimpse at the future of the plowing tradition. A record 35 young competitors took to the fields for the Junior Plowing Competition, including two competing with horses. This year's match was rich in history, marking the 50th anniversary of the first IPM hosted in Bruce County in 1976 and returning to the same Walkerton-area farmland that welcomed the match in both 1976 and 1993.
Another piece of Bruce County IPM history returned to the spotlight with the much-anticipated return of Team Farmall and its square-dancing tractors. The hometown crowd favourite first delighted IPM audiences when Bruce County hosted the match in Teeswater in 2008, and returned to perform after a seven-year hiatus.
The match provided Bruce County with an opportunity to introduce tens of thousands of visitors to its agricultural sector, rural communities, businesses and people. The week also coincided with Ontario's inaugural Rural Ontario Week, providing an especially fitting backdrop for an event rooted in celebrating the people, businesses and communities that contribute to rural Ontario.
“The International Plowing Match has endured and evolved for more than a century because communities continue to embrace it and make it their own,” said Melvin Switzer, president of the Ontario Plowmen's Association (OPA). “Bruce County did exactly that. The enthusiasm of the volunteers, sponsors, exhibitors, competitors and visitors could be felt throughout the week.”
But for organizers, some of the most important measures of success cannot be captured by attendance numbers, alone. They are found in the school children discovering agriculture, the conversations between farmers and consumers, the competitors carrying forward generations of plowing tradition, the businesses and organizations making new connections, and the friendships forged among the local and provincial volunteers working toward a common goal.
“For five days, we had the privilege of showing tens of thousands of people what makes Bruce County special,” said Lang. “They saw our agriculture, our communities and our hospitality — but most importantly, they met our people. We hope they left with great memories and a reason to come back.”
With this year's match now complete, the IPM tradition moves on to Petrolia in Lambton County, host of the 2027 event.
Written ByLiz Dadson is the founder and editor of the Kincardine Record and has been in the news business since 1986.
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