Gina Parkinson is won over by her first visit to the Eden Project.

COMING back to the garden after a few days away is exciting and there are usually lots of things to do. Spending time apart is said to be good for any relationship and when one is as obsessed with something as I allegedly am it does the two of us good to have some distance.

This time last week me and my husband were travelling to Cornwall for a few days. The top of my agenda in the short break was to visit The Eden Project at long last. We had fantastic weather once the rain left us in the Midlands, arriving at our B&B in early evening sunshine that lasted without a break until we left four days later.

Having had plenty of wet UK holidays, this time everything fell into place from visiting the Bude Food fair that happened to be on that weekend to sunny walks on the shipwreck coast of the Devon and Cornish borders and, of course, the trip to Eden.

Cornwall is such a long way to go to visit a garden but this 35-acre site is well worth the effort. It is true that we visited on a perfect day, the sun shone but wasn’t too hot, so the Rainforest biome (one of the large transparent domes) was bearable. Also, it was late September so there were no crowds or queues. It is also true that although some reaction to our trip was met with enthusiasm there were also lukewarm comments and suggestions of other, "better" gardens to visit. I am firmly in the former camp and am even wondering if we could make it again within the year; our tickets are valid until next September.

So back to autumn in our gardens and the mild weather is keeping things going very nicely. Summer bedding is continuing to flourish with begonias and pelargoniums still filling pots with bright colour.

Nasturtiums have done well in or garden this year despite caterpillar attention in June and July. Being soft hearted I just let them be and although some plants looked ragged after a couple of weeks or so they have all recovered and are once again covered in foliage and flowers. I grew just one sort from seedlings bought on a market stall so am not sure of the variety. The small plants were potted up and grown on for a while before being put into the garden where some inevitably succumbed to the slugs. These plants are martyrs to pests it seems but at least ours didn’t get blackfly too.

The nasturtiums that survived these trials have spread themselves about luxuriously with long stems that cover the ground or climb up into nearby plants. Their flowers are brightest of orange which contrasts or clashes with other blooms depending on your point of view. On a sunny day bees will forage deep in the flowers and of course there will be large and small white butterflies busy laying eggs underneath the soft leaves. This attraction can be utilised in the vegetable garden where nasturtiums are sometimes used as companion plants, inserted near cabbages to attract the butterflies away from the crop.

Nasturtiums are annual plants that originally came from South America. There are numerous varieties that range in colour and size from pale lemon through to dark red. Some will climb, others form neat clumps but what they all can provide is bright colour in the garden until the first frosts cause the stems to collapse into a soggy mess. At this point they can be cleared away but by then seeds will already have fallen unnoticed on to the ground. These will often overwinter successfully and germinate the following spring although gathering a few from the plants to store is also a good idea. These can them be sown in compost next April or May.

I have found that the ones left in the garden grow more slowly but form stronger plants and seem to avoid problems with blackfly especially. Perhaps by the time they get to decent, edible, size the blackfly have already colonised the broad beans.

Weekend catch up

Leaves are dropping from the trees so it is time to sort out a leaf bin for the falling foliage. Leaves gathered last year may be ready to spread on to the garden but if it hasn’t yet broken down it will need to be left another year. Just give it a good turning over with a garden fork to break it up a bit and get air into it. This year's leaves will need to be piled up separately to break down either in a simple wire enclosure or in black bin liners pierced top and bottom to allow rain in and out.

Autumn foliage can be left on beds for small creatures to shelter and worms to pull down into the soil but it should be raked off the lawn and also cleared away from semi-tender plants such as lavender and santolina.

Gardening TV and radio

Tomorrow

7am, BBC2, Great British Garden Revival. Advice on front gardens and how to grow wild flowers.

8am, BBC2, Gardeners’ World.

8am, BBC Radio Humberside, The Great Outdoors. With Blair Jacobs and Doug Stewart.

8.30am, BBC2, The Beechgrove Garden. Pumpkins are on the menu today.

9am, Radio York, Julia Lewis. News and features from the gardens and countryside of North Yorkshire.

9am, BBC Radio Leeds, Tim Crowther with Joe Maiden.

2pm, BBC R4, Gardeners’ Question Time. The team answer questions from gardeners in Winchester.

Friday

3pm, BBC R4, Gardeners’ Question Time. Eric Robson chairs the programme from London’s Landscape Show with panellists Pippa Greenwood, Matthew Wilson and James Wong.

9.30pm, BBC2, Gardeners’ World. Monty plants onions and garlic and there’s a trip to Derry to meet a daffodil enthusiast.