Puppet show about paleoecology

On October 10th, the Graduate School for Production Ecology and Resource Conservation (PE&RC) hosted its annual PE&RC Day, themed: “PE&RC Digs Deeper: Finding Answers to Sustain Our Soils.”

During this event, the selection process for their institutional collaboration call was concluded. Work Package 5 from the Soil Geography and Landscape group at Wageningen University and Research had submitted a proposal to collaborate with the Ecosystem and Landscape Dynamics group from the University of Amsterdam.

The final stage of the selection required each group to deliver a six-minute pitch. Over the years, it has become tradition to make these pitches as creative as possible. To embrace this spirit, we decided to forget the usual PowerPoint presentation and instead performed a puppet show using hand-painted signs to visually illustrate the concepts and significance of our research.

We are thrilled to announce that both the expert panel and the public vote favored our proposal, resulting in our selection for the grant! This grant will allow us to extend our research by an additional four months and take on a new project in collaboration with Prof. Dr. William Gosling and Dr. Crystal McMichael from the Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics (IBED) at the University of Amsterdam.

As paleoecologists, they bring valuable expertise to our team, enabling us to explore how the grasslands in Bardia National Park have evolved over time. Together, we will collect new samples from our study area and conduct detailed analyses of grass phytoliths and charcoal. These findings will provide insights into past transitions between forest and grassland, helping us better understand the ecological value of these grasslands and informing future landscape management practices.