Just over three years ago I was standing up to my waist in cold water, somewhere in the vicinity of Cambridge. I was catching sticklebacks for the first experiments of my PhD. Now, 37 months later, I am in the final stages of writing-up and will actually hand in my thesis in ten days time! During this last chapter of my PhD, I have also become a dad and am actually writing this with my 5 month-old son in the carrier on my chest. Luckily, after a nice walk with our dog in the cold autumn air, he has fallen vast asleep.

If it wasn’t for all funding falling away at the 3 year mark, one and a half month ago, I would be continuing with some additional exciting data chapters of which I already got the data. However, with five data chapters, two of which are published and two have been accepted, I have enough exciting work to talk about. In the months to come, I will be wrapping up a lot of small and large stickleback projects that I have done over the years and that have not made it into my thesis, besides some nice collaborative studies, and will continue with further experiments on the link between personality and collective behaviour as a Postdoc!

Now, time to get back to thesis writing..