Enjoy it on video: Harrogate Autumn Flower Show

With preparations well under way for the start of the show, Jill Fish, a member of the show team, valiantly pushed the huge green for overnight storage as standard fridges just couldn’t hold the whopper that has been grown by Peter Glazebrook of Newark.

The monster cabbage will be used today by a team of top chefs, on the first day of the three-day show, in a bid to break a world record on the number of dishes prepared from a single giant cabbage.

Yesterday, as organisers and exhibitors put the finishing touches to the show gardens and displays, a show spokeswoman said: “This cabbage is on its way for the chop to make 105 dishes in a single day.

“It’s being refrigerated overnight, we’ve had to use a walk-in meat locker to ensure it can fit in.”

The prestigious flower show, at the Great Yorkshire Showground, in Harrogate, is being staged today, tomorrow and Sunday. It features the annual giant vegetable competition, stunning plant nursery displays, live expert demonstrations and other attractions.

This year it also becomes the first UK gardening event to offer full-sized autumn show gardens. Eight new gardens have been created by designers and landscapers from across the country and yesterday TV gardener Katie Rushworth, from Bingley, a presenter on Alan Titchmarsh’s Love Your Garden, was at the event, watching as the final touches were made to the gardens ahead of judging.

“I like to support my local gardening events and see what is going on in my local areas and support the nurseries,” she said.

Katie, who also runs the design company Queen of Spades, will be meeting visitors each day of the show and will take part in the Dig It Garden Theatre tomorrow and Sunday. She will also be giving a demonstration on favourite autumn plants at 12.30pm tomorrow.

Show director Martin Fish said: “Show gardens are one of our most popular features and we are proud to become the first UK gardening event to offer large autumn show gardens, as well as those traditionally featured in the spring.

“The gardening year really begins in the autumn with plans for new planting, so it is particularly good to have such a diverse range of show garden ideas and plants at the show, to give our visitors a great start for the new 2014 gardening season.”

Yesterday Ian Precious was putting the finishing touches to one of the gardens, Kin Space, created by The Walled Garden, Ripon, which with its outdoor seating and a plot to grow fruit and vegetables is designed to be a garden for the whole family to enjoy.

Mr Precious also welcomed the addition of the show gardens to the autumn line-up: “Hopefully the public can come and look at these gardens and take little ideas away with them for their own gardens and that great for us designers and its great for the public.”

One of the show’s gardening halls features a sea of more than 5,000 fabulous autumn blooms, with a range of colours and aromas on display, including ornamental lilies.

Ian Roger, of RV Roger Ltd, in Pickering, was putting the finishing touches to his display of roses. The company is celebrating its centenary year.

Mr Roger said the wet, windy weather over the past few days had not helped his preparations.

“It was a glorious summer – just a few more days of good weather would have been nice,” he said.

Not just plants are showcased. The Harrogate and Ripon Beekeepers Association has a display at the event and members were yesterday setting out beeswax candles shaped like figures, cats and other designs.

There has been plenty of concern about the country’s dwindling bee population.

Judith Rowbottom, from the society, said the honey bee population had been hit by the bad weather the country had suffered in recent years but the good weather over the summer had helped boost the numbers once again.

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