An alternative to straw around strawberries

For the past few years I've been using shredded paper instead of straw around strawberries and it's done a perfectly decent job. It eventually starts clumping together and disappearing (possibly birds run off with it, possibly it disintegrates), but at the start of the season I simply empty my shredder all over the strawberry bed and brush it off the leaves. A nice thick layer works best. You can water on top of it, I always do.

In other news, I've had a big weekend digging, weeding, mowing, sowing and planting and the garden now has that pristine, ready-to-go look.

It's slightly marred by the fact that I've left a big bush of rocket and my kale in the ground because I want to collect seeds from them. The kale at least is most of the way there. It's flowered and formed seed pods. Now they just need to ripen before I need the bed for beans. I wouldn't be bothering with the kale if if hadn't been so hard getting seeds during lockdown. The rocket is well worth it, though, I find it hard to coax rocket seeds from a packet to germinate, but when they self-sow they germinate everywhere!

Scarlet kale seed pods

I've also planted out this year's kale, interspersed with turnips and kohlrabi. All three of them are brassicas, so belong together in my crop rotation. The reason I've interspersed them is because the kale plants need to be planted 60 cm apart, but it won't need all that distance until later in the year. In the meantime I'm growing turnips and kohlrabi in between them that should be ready to harvest before the kale needs all that space.

Also, just as I was giving up hope on my carrots, they've finally germinated. No such luck with the parsnips, but after watching Frances Tophill at her allotment on Gardeners' World I've resown them much more thickly than I did the first time. They have until the end of May, if there's no sign of them by then I'll sow another root vegetable in their place.