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Ok this isn't some daft question about the plain black bases that come with models but more my naturally found basing materials..
Honest opinions please guys

Yes.

The rocks/ slate not really, the grass tufts are fine without.
The sand yes, or at least washing/ shading. As it is it just looks a little too obviously 'stuff glued to a black plastic base', especially if you let the black plastic show through under the sand and rocks.

Striktly speaking no.
But.
They will probably look too finely textured, too realistically weathered and so on to look well with the model on them. The contrast may be distracting from your model.

Yeah this is just a rough idea gonna give the bases a spray of dark/med brown then glue bits on etc. and give gravel a wash with a brown ink, was more interested in the slate as I have a near endless supply.

Natural materials generally look "out of scale," as some have put it, without painting. Left natural, we immediately recognize them as what they are, i.e. sand is simply sand - not scaled down gravel next to a scaled down man/woman/alien. Because the models are painted, things won't become a cohesive whole without applying the same illusory effects to both base and model.

Seems somewhat counter-intuitive to paint sand as sand and rocks as rocks, but I consider it necessary for the suspension of disbelief. Very rarely do I not find unpainted materials visually jarring.

Oh the slate looks fine - I wouldn't waste time painting it. If the sand and plastic bases is painted it should look great.

Here's some smaller bits of slae I used unpainted on my Falklands troops

The sand looks kind of unprofessional but the slate is ok.