In the small community of Union, Andrew Wyton has been caring for over 1000 dahlias growing in his front yard. He’s taken his passion to social media, creating a following of more than 400,000 people across all platforms.
Mr. Wyton’s love for dahlias started around ten years ago after his mother gave him three dahlia plants. In 2019, he bought a house and started planting the garden.
He originally started selling dahlias in 2021 with Wildflowers Farm, just south of St. Thomas, before his wife encouraged him to set up a stand in the front yard.
The garden continued to grow quickly, needing more rows. Then in August 2025, while taking a 1046-kilometre-long bike ride around Lake Erie, he reached an epiphany – he wanted to share his dahlia garden with the world. So, he continued to expand the garden and started uploading to various social media platforms.
Almost every morning he finds time to care for the garden, trimming, watering and creating content from sunrise until around 11 a.m. Mr. Wyton makes around 40 bunches of dahlias a day, selling them all before the day ends.
When frost comes, he cuts down the garden and saves the tuber, which is the “bulb” in the ground that the flower grows from. He saves the tubers, for next seasons plant and selling the extra.
Known as “Dahlia Mandrew” online, Mr. Wyton has kept busy creating content. He posted more than 400 videos in August this year and is currently doing a series called “cutting a new dahlia every day until it frosts” and he’s almost at day 150.
“Now I just have to do this for the rest of my life,” laughed Mr. Wyton, as the community he created became his livelihood.
Outside of gardening, Mr. Wyton has a passion for filmmaking. He creates videos for Railway City Tourism and has posted surfing videos on social media. Both helped him easily transition into making content for his garden.
He plans on expanding his videography, wanting to create a weekly “planting dahlias” guide to help answer questions people ask him online. He also hopes to one day own a field of dahlias, wanting to host dinner parties in a massive garden.
By Jayden Davis, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter Aylmer Express, Canadian Press
