This is part three of our conversation with Mary Hunter. Just before Thanksgiving we spent a delightful afternoon catching up with Mary. We started out talking about gardening and the growing of cilantro. That led us to extinction and then to shaping and finding approximations that create early success.

We talked about Carol Dweck’s work on growth versus fixed mindsets. We described several strategies for becoming more creative in finding constructional approaches to training, We even talked about Dr Doug Tallamy’s backyard national parks and my other podcast - Horses for Future.

We came to a lovely stopping place. At this point we had talked already for a couple of hours. We needed to stop. But then I asked Mary if there were any other topics she had wanted to explore - possibly for another recording session.

Mary hesitated for a moment. Should she even bring this up? We had been talking for a very long time. It was the middle of the afternoon when we started and now it was getting dark. She’d just share this one idea - for later. But that didn’t work because the subject was helmets.

Helmets! Why helmets? What was that about? We needed to know more. We were too impatient to record it at another time, so here it is as part of this current conversation.

What is the connection between riding helmets, recycling and horse training? You’re about to find out.