Sam, the helmet on the dog always makes me smile.
Good luck, Stephen. Hope he's a winner. Everyone wants to "work with trees".
I figure one good indication of someone's interest is to hand them paper and pen, tell them 4-5 most needed knots, and that animatedknots.com has all they need to learn. See what happens. I tell them that I will pay them for training time at home, same as at work.
I think I'm going to start telling applicants during an initial phone contact that a RB and clove hitch will cover most bases, and animatedknot.com is a useful resource, then give them a piece of rope at the interview. See if they did any homework.