The Wrecclesham Conservation Group was instigated by Myung-hye Chun and established in January 2024 with its initial focus on the 200-year-old St Peter’s Churchyard in Wrecclesham. In addition to its primary function as a burial site, the churchyard is also recognised as an important local green space especially as the village as a whole has become more built up. Green spaces such as the churchyard are an essential part of our local infrastructure especially with the pressures of increased house building and urbanisation. Ideally everyone should live within a short distance of such spaces for their own mental well-being and health, but they also have the potential to act as “wildlife corridors” helping species spread in otherwise increasingly urbanised areas.

Wrecclesham Conservation Group (WCG) is run as a not-for-profit unregistered charity community group of volunteers aiming to improve the Wrecclesham area for both people and wildlife through maintaining, recording and enhancing its landscape, environment and biodiversity.  Any funds raised go towards purchasing tools, equipment and materials, holding events to pursue these aims and maintaining the group infrastructure.

Our members meet regularly for work sessions twice a month throughout the year to cut back and tend to the wilder overgrown areas of the churchyard. Some of our work is held jointly with other groups and is often led by experts in their various fields.  As a group we carry out wildlife surveys, participate in local events and hold talks, nature walks etc. See the News section for past highlights. We share our experiences about local wildlife and other matters of conservation and biodiversity and use our dedicated Facebook and WhatsApp groups particularly in this respect, operating as a lively virtual community.

A small committee of members oversees and guides our activities and events. We are privileged to count amongst our members and key partners some highly knowledgeable folk who are more than happy to share their wisdom, making Wrecclesham Conservation Group very welcoming for anyone with an interest in nature, regardless of their own level of expertise.

Through our surveys we have recorded many different species of animals. Among those active by day insects such as bees (24 species identified), butterflies (19 species identified) and flies (54 species identified) are dominant. Whereas by night there are moths (216 species identified) and other invertebrates such as slugs (5 species identified) and snails (10 species identified) and woodlice (3 species identified). There are probably many more species that we have yet still to identify. The search goes on!

Wrecclesham Conservation Group are very keen that youngsters show an active and constructive interest in the natural world, so we are delighted that a number of young people come along to our churchyard work sessions. We also welcome families with younger children to our special events and talks. For schools with pupils wanting to do conservation work as volunteering for their Duke of Edinburgh Award, we aim to provide suitable work sessions.