In Madagascar, questions of economic development and environmental change are paramount, and, given the dependence of most people on agricul- ture, tightly interlinked. As a result, one might ask: What is happening to the landscape, why, and how does it affect or reflect the wellbeing of the people and of nature? I have addressed various aspects of exactly this question through the political ecology (PE) approach in which I was trained-case study oriented, contextualized in history, ecology, ideology, and social relations. Here I present the results of a different approach, a land change science (LCS) study using a spatially stratified sample of regional data from air photo analyses. I describe how the study was framed through a PE agenda, and how its findings have political ecological clout. I also reflect on the humbling experience of carrying out the study and the concrete, pragmatic implications for hybrid PE-LCS approaches.