Surrey’s ancient grasslands – once used for grazing – are among Surrey’s most delicate and biodiverse habitats, but many have been lost for a variety of reasons. Now they are getting the recognition and protection they deserve.

These grasslands support a unique and declining biodiversity, including plants and fungi, a great many invertebrates, and some of their ecologically dependent vertebrates.

They are havens for wildflowers and wildlife including Small Blue butterflies and skylarks, and the last remaining habitats left for the diversity of colourful wildflowers, such as bee orchids and horseshoe vetch.

The most impressive ancient grasslands are on the chalk in the North Downs, but acidic sandy pastures and flood plains elsewhere in the county also support a large variety of plant, bird, reptile and invertebrate species.

The grasslands have been lost for a variety of reasons including conversion to arable farming, to grow more food, more quickly. Many have been re-sown as pasture with rye-grass-dominated species, with their soils altered by using fertilisers and by increasing drainage.

Weedkillers and pesticides have been applied to eliminate the pernicious “weeds”, fungi, beetles, bugs and molluscs.

Now Surrey’s grasslands are set to be better understood and hopefully now protected. A team of conservation and land-management organisations have collaborated to gather field data and work together to ensure Surrey’s ancient grasslands are managed as effectively as possible to support biodiversity long into the future.

They are led by Surrey Wildlife Trust (SWT) with the Surrey Nature Partnership, and include Surrey Biodiversity Information Centre, Surrey County Council, Natural England, Surrey Botanical Society and local advisers from Butterfly Conservation and the Surrey Fungus Study Group

An interim report, Surrey Old Grasslands, is now available online at https://tinyurl.com/surreygrasslands

It lists sites supporting the best examples of all types of grasslands, whether in the North Downs, on old commons and village greens, and in parks and churchyards.

SWT’s director of research and monitoring, Mike Waite, said: “It has long been the dream of Surrey’s amateur botanists to catalogue systematically the species-rich pastures of a bygone era, and to offer them comparable planning protection to Ancient Woodland as a better recognised, collective resource. It’s an important step towards forging a more positive relationship with all our native species and landscapes for the benefit of everyone.”

New grassland sites have been discovered thanks to investigations in south-west Surrey led by Mike. “New records of declining plants such as sneezewort, hoary cinquefoil, harebell and common cudweed pointed me towards hitherto unrecognised species-rich pastures, which will now be recommended as new Sites of Conservation Importance (SNCIs), which must be considered for protection by planning authorities when they are determining development applications.”

More surveys organised by Mike and his colleagues will be conducted across Surrey, investigating over 100 sites all the way up to the river Thames flood plain.

The grasslands inventory will be finalised in early 2026. It is already helping shape Surrey’s statutory Local Nature Recovery Strategy, hopefully to enshrine the protection of these sites within local and regional planning and biodiversity policies while also influencing the direction of Biodiversity Net Gain opportunities and a Nature Recovery Network for the county.

With increasing pressures on wild places from developers and policymakers, this work is essential for the protection of truly irreplaceable habitats.

You can read more about Surrey’s Local Nature Recovery Strategy online at https://tinyurl.com/SLNRS