This drastic measure scares many gardeners. It will pay you back in spades

By now we’re all familiar with the vagaries of fashion. Once people double down on some plants they sideline others. The plants that fell out of favour in recent decades were shrubs.

In our rush to embrace airy spontaneity we started to lose our taste for anything so constant as a bush. Loose sweeps of perennials were hailed as dashing and dynamic while shrubs came to seem a little, well, permanent.

The woody meadow at Birrarung Marr, Melbourne was one of two pilot plots planted nine years agoCredit: University of Melbourne

But happily attitudes are changing. The constancy of shrubs, it turns out, is their strength. They are resilient during hot, dry summers and in the face of other climate extremes. All year round, they provide habitat for wildlife and beauty for people.

Plant them en masse and they can even exude meadow-like wildness. In a twist that few saw coming, our penchant for naturalistic grasslands has actually helped fan the resurgence of plantings composed entirely of shrubs.

Woody meadows are being planted alongside railway lines, such as this one beside the Upfield line in Melbourne.Credit: University of Melbourne

When the first “woody meadows” were unveiled in two Melbourne parks in September 2016 they were like no shrubberies that had gone before. “Speculative” is how the University of Melbourne researchers behind them described them.

They were composed of a wide array of densely planted, structurally diverse Australian shrubs that flowered at different times of year. The aim was to create public plantings that were more lively and exciting than the ones you typically find in public places, but that didn’t cost any more to maintain.

They are also revitalising streetscapes such as this one in Balaclava.Credit: Ben Ford

They succeeded. At least 59 woody meadows have now been established in Australian cities. They are outside train stations in Sydney, on verges in Perth and South Australia and on roundabouts and in railway sidings in Melbourne. These layered shrubby plantings, which can be adapted to all contexts and climates, look so good that home gardeners have also been getting on board.

But without expert guidance, it can be difficult to know where to start. The University of Melbourne has just made the process easier by publishing online guidelines. While the 91-page guidelines are largely geared towards those in the public sphere, they are suitable for anyone wanting to grow such shrubby communities at home.

Woody Meadow Guidelines: Naturalistic plantings of Australian woody plants for people and nature by Associate Professor Claire Farrell, Associate Professor John Rayner and Doctor Rachael Bathgate specifies how to design, plant and maintain these native expanses.

For home gardeners, one of the most confronting parts of their maintenance regime will be the practice of coppicing. Hard pruning each shrub to a height of only 15 to 30 centimetres above the ground every two to four years is a central part of caring for a woody meadow. It rejuvenates the planting by stimulating new foliage and flowers and it helps retain the diversity across the different shrubs.

But it’s not easy to wrap your head around. Take secateurs, brush cutters or even a chainsaw to your entire woody meadow and it feels like you are losing everything.

“People freak out about coppicing,” Farrell said at a recent symposium to mark 10 years of woody meadow research. “Getting them to do it as hard as it needs to be can be challenging.”

But most Australian woody plants resprout after coppicing and the cutback will pay you back in spades. New shoots appear in the first few weeks and there can even be fresh flowers within a month.

As for which Australian shrubs (and possibly also some subshrubs, climbers and small trees) to choose, the guidelines advise a mix of robust species that are “proven performers” in local landscapes as well as a sprinkling of others that are more experimental. Each woody meadow contains two to three layers (the height of each layer will depend on the site) and you will need to choose plants for each layer.

While at least 12 different species are commonly used in public settings, most home gardeners will settle on fewer species because of space constraints and the fact that each different plant needs to be used multiple times to create repetition across the meadow. But you will fit in more plants than you might expect because of the high density of the planting – six to seven plants per square metre – a measure that helps exclude weeds.

While irrigation is essential during establishment, by selecting only hardy, drought-tolerant plants, you will not need to irrigate after the first 12 months.

You also won’t have to reapply mulch because woody meadows are planted into a 100-200-millimetre-deep layer of crushed scoria or other inorganic, mineral substrate applied over the top of the soil. This acts as both planting medium and mulch and helps ensure that, for all their high-excitement looks, these plantings remain low-maintenance.

Get to the heart of what’s happening with climate change and the environment. Sign up for our fortnightly Environment newsletter.