Canadian peat extraction for the 2026 season finished below expected levels in several regions, but the Canadian Sphagnum Peat Moss Association (CSPMA) says the gap should not be read as a shortage. In a Sept. 17 report covering conditions through Aug. 31, the association attributes much of the shortfall to wet weather and says careful inventory management should still allow producers to meet customer needs.
What the Extraction Numbers Show
The report reveals substantial regional variation rather than a single national result. Alberta reached 56% of expected extraction, Manitoba 79%, Saskatchewan 90% and Ontario 90%. Quebec's North and South Shores reached 77%, Southern New Brunswick 70% and Northern New Brunswick 85%. Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and Labrador and Nova Scotia were reported as significantly below expected levels.
How those percentages are defined matters. CSPMA's expected-extraction figure is not a measure of how much available peatland was harvested. It reflects the volume producers calculated they needed for the season: market requirements plus the desired year-end inventory buffer, minus inventory carried into 2026. A shortfall against that target is therefore a planning gap rather than a direct measure of resource availability.
The more useful question for growers, the column argues, is not whether peat will run out, but how resilient a growing-media strategy is when one depended-on material becomes harder or more expensive to secure.
The Risk Extends Beyond Peat
Peat is only one part of a broader supply picture. Climate affects harvest and biomass availability, labor affects harvesting, processing and transportation, and freight can change the economics of a material long before its FOB price moves.
Transportation is under particular pressure. The Wall Street Journal reported in late September that U.S. contract trucking rates averaged $3.11 per mile in August, including fuel surcharges, up 29% from a year earlier. Diesel prices, driver availability, rail surcharges and ocean freight all add volatility. For bulky inputs such as growing media, delivered cost can quickly change the answer to a sourcing decision.
Dr. Charlie Hall has made a similar point from the perspective of grower costs. In a recent Greenhouse Grower interview, he emphasized supply-chain agility, backup suppliers and working-capital discipline as growers plan for 2027. His Index of Prices Paid by Growers is useful, the author notes, because the cheapest input on paper is not necessarily the lowest-risk or lowest-cost choice once freight, inventory and operational impacts are included.
Design From the Crop Backward
The column argues that growing media is often built in the wrong direction: starting with what is available, such as peat, coir, bark, wood fiber or perlite, and then constructing a mix around those ingredients. A better starting point, it suggests, is the crop itself.
What character does the root zone need? How much water holding and air porosity? What structural stability is required through the crop cycle? How does the material need to rewet? What buffering and chemistry can the crop and irrigation program tolerate? How uniform does it need to be for automation? Once those requirements are clear, ingredients and percentages can be chosen to create that character.
This matters because the raw-material toolbox is expanding. Wageningen University and Research's 2026 work on the future of growing media identifies market-accepted materials such as coir, coniferous wood fiber, bark, compost and perlite, alongside less familiar candidates including other plant fibers, biochars, co-composts and reused growing media. The researchers note that many new materials require processing, sanitization and stabilization before they can become reliable horticultural inputs, meaning availability is not the same as suitability.
Reassessing Overlooked Materials
Processing technology has continued to improve across coir, wood fiber, bark and other biomass streams. Materials that were too inconsistent, too wet, too coarse, too salty, too difficult to handle or simply too expensive several years ago may deserve another look, as may regional agricultural residues that can be cleaned, screened, fiberized, composted or otherwise processed into more consistent ingredients.
The column is careful about the scope of that advice. It does not suggest replacing a proven substrate simply because something new is available, but rather knowing what else exists before it is needed. A material also does not have to become 30% or 40% of a formulation to be useful; in some systems a 5% or 10% inclusion may be enough to change cost, water behavior, structure, rewetting or supply exposure. The right rate is a crop and system question, and any new component needs to be trialed and validated before commercial adoption.
Local and Global Are Not Either/Or
Interest in sourcing closer to home is understandable. Regional materials can reduce transportation exposure and add flexibility, particularly when they can be processed near the point of use. But local is not automatically better, just as imported is not automatically risky. Coir, for example, travels a long distance but can offer characteristics that are difficult to reproduce with some local materials, while peat remains an important and effective growing-media component.
A more resilient strategy, the author suggests, is likely a portfolio: dependable core materials, strong supplier relationships, some regional options, some globally sourced options, and enough formulation knowledge to adjust without losing the root-zone character the crop requires.
Using 2026 as a Planning Signal
The lesson from this year's Canadian peat harvest is not that growers should move away from peat. CSPMA itself says inventory management should allow producers to meet customer requirements. The lesson, the column argues, is that the conditions behind raw materials can change quickly while crops still have to be produced on schedule. Weather, labor, freight, tariffs and supply-chain disruptions in recent years have shown that yesterday's dependable supply pattern is not guaranteed to remain tomorrow's.
Growing-media demand is also rising. Wageningen research projects global demand increasing substantially toward 2050, which implies a need for a broader basket of materials and more processing capacity rather than a different winner in the peat-versus-coir-versus-wood-fiber debate.
For growers planning 2027, the author recommends asking a few practical questions:
- Which raw materials are most exposed in my current formulation?
- What is their true delivered cost?
- Which characteristics are essential to my crop?
- What other ingredients could deliver part of that function?
- Which of those should I begin trialing now?
The best time to build flexibility into a growing-media program, the column concludes, is while choices still exist. The piece is written by Jennifer Neujahr, former director of horticulture business for Profile Products and co-founder, with Ted Buis, of Next Step Solutions.