Seaforth's Dugald McIntosh represents at national plowing championship
BY SCOTT STEPHENSON
Eighteen-year-old Dugald McIntosh of Seaforth turned in an impressive performance at the 2025 Huron County Plowing Match (HCPM); he won first place in the Junior Day competition on Thursday, then followed with a second-place finish in his class on Friday, missing the top spot by just two points. The experience also offered McIntosh a tune-up for the Canadian Plowing Championships (CPC) in Ayton, which he will be competing in next week.
During the short stretch of time between matches, The Citizen caught up with the promising young competitor to learn about the “lay of the land” in the world of competitive plowing.
McIntosh started plowing six years ago. “My grandpa and my uncle used to plow, and that’s their plow that I’m using today, still. Most people have a very similar plow. It’s a two-furrow competition plow - they’re getting hard to find now. Most of them are from the 60s, 70s and 80s.”
After that first spark of familial interest, McIntosh joined a local gang of like-minded young people. “I learned a lot through our 4-H plowing club: the Huron County Sodbusters. We have a bunch of great leaders there, and we have Brian McGavin and Don Dodds helping us,” he told The Citizen. “It’s a great program. You can learn a lot about stewardship of the land. There’s just an endless amount of tips and tricks. We still learn more every time. It’s just a great bunch of people to get along with.”
When he first started plowing competitively at around 12 years old, he loved it right away. “It was a lot of fun. It was challenging. There were a lot of things to learn, but it was a great time,” he recalled. “I wanted to come back and do it again.”
McIntosh kept plowing, and he started winning. Last year, he was crowned the Junior Champion at the International Plowing Match (IPM) outside of Lindsay, Ontario, which earned him entry into the CPC.
Preparation, he explains, is key to success.
“It’s greatly important to measure everything on your plow, make sure everything’s running true and parallel. Make sure all of your adjustments are free. You don’t want to be fighting with stuff in a timed event like the plowing match.”
On the field, precision is everything. “You line up your three stakes and you stare at them. You don’t look at anything else, because if you look at anything else, that’s where you’ll go. A great furrow is perfectly straight. Straightness is always your biggest thing. If you’re on a side hill, you’re fighting that, but any time, you’re just trying to go straight - there’s no stubble or grass showing. All your furrows look exactly the same across the field.”
He believes that learning to plow can teach people more than just tractor techniques. “It’s great life skills - just being around the plowing match and talking to people. Agriculture in this area is so strong - it’s a really great community. Everybody pretty much knows each other and they’re always willing to help.”
When it comes to tractors, McIntosh doesn’t hesitate to stand by his favourite colour. “It’s got to be blue,” he declared. “It went from Ford to New Holland… I do have a soft spot for Versatiles too. We have one or two of them on our farm.”
In addition to competing himself, McIntosh already has a reputation for coaching others to victory. He was the plow coach to this year’s Queen of the Furrow (QotF), Gracie Hoggarth, as well as last year’s winner, Mackenzie Terpstra, both of whom won the plowing portion of the competition. There are two qualities that he thinks makes for a good Queen - “Patience, and just being able to stay calm when there’s a lot of people watching you.”
That same principle applies to Queen coaching. “Patience, and to be able to slow down and give clear advice. It’s easy to do it, but it’s not very easy to tell someone how to do it.”
But McIntosh isn’t Seaforth’s first queenmaker - his grandfather, Bob Fotheringham, was the coach for QotF legend Amy Beccario (née Stewart). Beccario was the first Huron County competitor to win the provincial crown at the International Plowing Match, a title she claimed during the infamous 1966 “Mud Match,” which means she plowed her way to victory through grueling, rain-soaked conditions.
The CPC represents the highest level a junior competitor can reach, and McIntosh is approaching the event with plenty of preparation and lots of practice. “The Huron County Plowing Match is good practice,” he pointed out. “It’s always nice practising with other people, talking to them and having a little more competition… we also have a wheat field here that’s been allowed to work up. So the practice is practical as well - it’s good for the farm.”
For McIntosh, plowing is about more than the competition. “I’m not really too worried about it - just go have a good time, and if you can come home with some prize money, that’s always a bonus… I always like talking to other competitors. It’s never usually a competition where you’re not friends. Everybody’s always fun to talk to. While you’re waiting for the judges to judge your plots, you talk to your competitors. It’s always great getting to know people from all around the area.”