NIOO held an Open Day on ecology on Saturday 1 October. It was only the third time the institute opened its doors to the public since moving into new Wageningen headquarters in 2011.

The theme of the Open Day was 'Nature's Inventions'. Visitors could see for themselves how these inventions are being used in one of the Netherlands' most sustainable buildings - we practice what we preach!

But visitors could do much more than watch. There was a range of hands-on activities, many especially for children: e.g. catching the caterpillar, spotting rubber duckies, rolling life-size dice in the fat Goose Game and taking selfies with giant microbes.

In addition, Doctor Ecology held consulting hours, there were guided tours of the building, the laboratories were bursting at the seams with people eager to find out more about life in the soil and DNA, our Poop = Gold project was on display and for a grand finale we had our Science Quiz.

We'd like to thank our more than 2000 visitors for making it a very busy and very rewarding day!