Aston Locks Nature Reserve

Today I visited the Aston Locks Nature Reserve just off the Montgomery Canal near Oswestry. I have been meaning to get here for a while now, it being only 30 minuets away from where I live, so I am quiet excited to find out what is there and what we will see and get to photograph.

I parked up and set out on my way just after 0730 am. It is the school summer holidays here in the UK at the moment, so I wanted to get there early, to avoid any children 😂 As I got down onto the canal, I was greeted by a pair of mute swans and their two cygnet. Though mute swans are very common here in the UK, this was actually my first time photographing them! And for there to be some of this year’s offspring with them, made it extra special. I tried to get down as low as I could, to try and get eye level with them, to make the image more immersive.

Once the little family had swam past, I started out towards the reserve. The reserve is in 3 parts, at Lock 1, there is a circular walk around a few smaller ponds, but the main reserve is between Lock 2 and Lock 3. I decided to head straight for that, en-route there were a lot of smaller birds like blue and great tits, wrens as well as some blackbirds handing out in the grasses, reeds and woods that lined the canal. I was able to get an image of a juvenile blackbird in a little gap in the foliage.

Once at Lock 2, I crossed the canal and headed into the main reserve. This first part was strimmed back on one side, but there were still some reeds, bushes and hogweed for the birds on the other side of the path. Here there was a flock of Goldfinch and some juvenile Blue Tits working the area for food.

I was able to get some images of one of the Blue Tits feeding on some seeds from one of the plants, which I am really pleased with – and we have only just arrived at the reserve!

Moving on, I tried to get some images of the Goldfinch, this proved to be more difficult as they were all moving as a flock, and there wasn’t any way for me to get around them, so they kept moving on away from me. I did eventually manage some images of a juvenile, but I know I can do better.

Next up was a stop-off in the custom-built hide that looks out over the first part of the main pond on the reserve. It is a beautiful hide and while there was not much activity on the pond, I had a bit of a sit out to see if anything would show itself.

To start with, it was one lone Mallard Duck, and occasionally a few Sand Martins swooping down over the water, both keeping their distance. After a short while, the duck soon became 3, and then 8 as a mother with her 4 almost adult offspring joined and swam across the pond.

As there wasn’t much going on, I decided to leave and continue my journey though the reserve. After leaving the hide, I saw a Grey Squirrel up in an oak tree and managed to get an image of that, before it rushed off into the thick ivy for cover.

I then ran into another juvenile Goldfinch, feeding on some seeds which was great to see and photograph, though my favourite of this set came after the Goldfinch moved onto some lower plants, as this made the bird eye level with me, and the background was much more pleasant.

There was a lot of bee action on the flowers here, so for the first time, I was able to use the Sony A7v in insect AF, to try and capture some images of the male Red-tailed Bumblebee. This was a bit difficult with the 200-600 lens, given its weight and minimum focus distance, but I did manage to get some image.

Further along, I spotted some more Mute Swans, this time on the pond, but they were quite far off. Two Grey Heron, also made an appearance at this point as they flew out of the reeds and out over the ponds.

I then moved back onto bees! I wanted to try and get one in flight, which has previously mentioned was quite hard, given their small size, speed of movement and my big heavy lens. It took a few attempts, but I did eventually manage to get some images that I am really happy with.

The next distraction were butterflies, again using the insect AF on the A7v, and backing up so that I could actually focus on the butterflies, I was able to capture some images of the Red Admiral, even managing to get one in flight! Though this does suffer from that one blade of grass being in the way!

As I got towards the end of the reserve, there were more Blue Tits and Goldfinch feeding on seeds, this was lovely to see and also capture on camera.

There is an open area in the comer of the reserve here, with views out over the end of the ponds, as with the start of the reserve, I could hear what was living in the reeds and bullrush, but alas, I wasn’t able to get any images.

I walked out to the end of the reserve at Lock 3 on the canal, but decided to walk back the way I had come, as I felt that as it was now later in the day, the canal would be getting busier with walkers. On the way back, I got another couple of images of butterflies, but that was it.

Back at Lock 2, I headed out to the pond on that side, as the map showed another hide here. Unfortunately, this area was not as well kept as the main hide, and the vegetation had taken over, blocking all views over the water. There was a track down the side, so I followed that to see where I would take me, unfortunately, it was a dead end, so I turned back to the canal and headed for Lock 1.

The ponds on Lock 1 were lovely, they were quite overgrown at the edges, making it a bit difficult to get a clean shot, but it also offered me a fair bit of cover from the birds here. There was a Moorhen and a mother duck with all her beautiful ducklings – the most gorgeous of all the baby birds 😍. Unfortunately for me, the ducklings were choosing to stay in the reeds and so I was unable to get any decent images of them, but it was lovely to see them.

Things then got a bit quieter as I made my way around, this pond is defiantly less used and while still passable all the way around, it was much more overgrown and I was grateful that I had trousers on rather than shorts.

After crossing a little bridge, the trail opens up with a bench next to a pond. This was a great spot to sit and take the weight off my shoulders, but also this area was nice and open, allowing me to get closer to the water and attempt to take some images of the Dragonflies, that were hovering around here.

I learnt quickly, that the easiest way to take photos of the dragonflies was to wait for them to land so that they were still. I got really lucky with an Emperor Dragonfly – our bulkiest dragonfly here in the UK, stopping pretty close in to me. I was at 600mm with these images and LOVE them! I think it is the reflection that makes these images for me as well as being able to get nice and low down.

There were also Demoiselle flies and some Red-eyed Damselflies, that being considerably smaller, were much harder to get any images of, epically as they were not landing close by. I did try to get some images of the dragonflies flying around, but really struggled with this, as they were really small in the image and so the AF struggled to find them.

After spending a bit of time here, I continued around the rest of the walk. Unfortunately, I didn’t see anything else, so went to try my luck with the ducklings before heading back to the car. This time they were in among the lily pads and so again, no images for me, though I wasn’t upset about it, given all the images I had created throughout my walk around the reserve.

I had an amazing morning out at the Aston Locks Nature Reserve and this will defiantly be a place that I go back to, especially when the winter migrants start to come back later in the year.