Surrey Heathland Partnership – volunteering opportunities

Practical conservation volunteering activities this spring season 2025

We are very pleased to now be running a regular, popular countryside volunteering task programme with our Surrey Heathland Partnership, offering a great selection of conservation task sessions to try on beautiful rare heathland sites in the Guildford and Woking areas, centred around Pirbright.

During the spring season, Surrey Heathland Partnership task leader Tasha is running practical conservation volunteering task sessions on Wednesdays on various, rare heathland sites across our partnership area.

Once we get back into scrub clearing season in the early autumn, we will return to running regular Thursday sessions as well, but during ground bird nesting season we reduce our weekly heathland volunteering task programme to one day per week.

The Surrey Heathland Partnership volunteer task programme is proving to be a great addition to the established weekly volunteer task programmes already on offer with the Downlands Partnership and Lower Mole Partnership.

Our heathland scrub and non-native plant species clearance sessions are ideal to try if you are new to practical conservation work.

The majority of our tasks are suitable for all ages (over 16s unless accompanied by an adult please) and abilities, as you can work at your own pace and you will be shown exactly what to do and how to use the hand tools provided. You do need to be fairly fit and enjoy getting out and about in the great outdoors.

How to get involved and find out more

If you have any questions or concerns, please do contact us before deciding which session would be best for you to start with. There is no fixed commitment with our conservation volunteering crew, you can join in on task days as often as you like, for full or half days (mornings). Our task sessions run from 10am and end by 3pm, subject to weather, with lunch and tea breaks.

Exercising whilst socialising in the great outdoors with friendly, like-minded people has recognised widespread health and well-being benefits and of course, supports the maintenance and restoration of the beautiful local countryside and its rare heathland habitat.

Please email Surrey Heathland Partnership task leader Tasha at heathlandproject@surreycc.gov.uk for further information including meeting points, for any advice and to let her know in advance when you would like to come and join in.

Please also see our Surrey Countryside Partnerships Volunteer Handbook 2024 (PDF).

To gain an insight into our Surrey Heathland Partnership conservation volunteering task days, please visit our Surrey Countryside Partnerships Facebook page.

We are keen to welcome more heathland habitat helpers to join and grow our great local Surrey Heathland Partnership conservation crew, so please do come and join in and give it a try, the more the merrier. We look forward to seeing you very soon.

Spring 2025 volunteer task programme

During April to June 2025 we have the following conservation volunteering task days on offer that are suitable for new volunteers to consider.

Our spring practical conservation task sessions will involve clearing and pulling up non-native invasive species such as Himalayan Balsam, cutting back targeted laurel or bramble and also dead hedging, all using hand tools.

This is in order to restore and maintain the rare heathland habitat, so the native flora and fauna can thrive and to support and increase biodiversity and to improve access.

Corporate and community groups volunteering offer

We are pleased to welcome corporate and local community/school groups by arrangement and are developing some great local corporate partnerships with various companies.

Please email us at: countrysidepartnershipsteam@surreycc.gov.uk and we can further discuss the best available options for your specific group size together, subject to preferred location and time of year, and to explain the booking arrangements for groups.

Please kindly note that some of the scheduled dates and locations as above listed may not be available or suitable for group involvement.

We have a separate Surrey Countryside Partnerships corporate volunteering brochure which fully explains our corporate offer, including our financial contribution rates for groups of five or more attendees, which you will receive when you make a group enquiry.

The autumn and winter seasons are the ideal time to join in as a group, especially for larger numbers, as we run lots of scrub clearing sessions on Wednesdays and Thursdays. We can sometimes offer bespoke separate team volunteering days at this time of year as well, usually on Tuesdays. Scrub clearance is the ideal countryside volunteering activity for staff team challenges.

Please note that during April to July we have very limited suitable task sessions for groups and we do not run a task programme in August, due to ground bird nesting season on the rare heathlands. We are currently taking bookings for June then September 2025 onwards for team countryside volunteering days, subject to group size.

We look forward to hearing from you and to developing many more great corporate partnerships with local companies and with those from neighbouring counties and London as well.

Files available to download

• Surrey Countryside Partnerships Volunteer Handbook 2024 (PDF)
  A comprehensive guide to getting involved with practical conservation volunteering with the Surrey Countryside Partnerships.