Korea Snowman, a horse trainer with 30 years of experience, discusses how John Deere's 8R tractor connects to the legacy of horses in African farming. The video explores precision agriculture and the challenges of working with horses in a promotional campaign.
I'm Korea Snowman. I'm a horse trainer. Horseman. I been doing this for 30 years. When I was 13, 14, I started doing this. It was a dream for me to do something for a company and it came true this year and last year. So I'm really pleased to have done this for John Deere. I personally like John Deere myself. I don't have one. I have a cap and that's it.
So we are at the 2020 AAT event in Pretoria, which is the first of its kind agricultural technology and innovation event in Africa. So behind me, as you can see, is our, well famed 8R tractor for which we recently released the 8R reveal video that has something to do with horses. If you look at the horse component of this video, we actually started with a campaign in October last year through a cakenet TV program called Our Farmers are Inspiration on Afrikaans Uns bura uns Insperasi. And within those 13 episodes, John Deere had a 30 second video clip which we basically said thank you to our farmers for being an inspiration for us and actually be more than just a farmer. And within each of those videos we've hidden something about a horse. Some might have seen it, some might have not seen it. It might be a horse picture against a wall.
My personal opinion about teaching horses something is that you can't teach them anything. There's some things you might have to sort of teach them, but you can't teach them anything because they know everything. They know how to lie down, they know how to sit, they can run, they can stop, they can turn, they can do everything. They can run collective, they can rear, they can do everything. The only thing you have to teach the horse is the cue to do the thing that he already can do really good. And all you have to tell him, if I do this, if I give you this cue, you just do that, that you really can do really well.
The horse is not only because there's horsepower in an engine of a tractor, but it's actually the preciseness that you get out of the horse. So taking a wild horse, spending the right energy and focus on that, you can actually tame it and have it execute certain commands that is not in the nature of that horse. And that's how we see the precision agriculture playing a role in our equipment. With the ATAR tractor being one of our smartest tractors ever built. We kind of saw the connection to bring in the, the preciseness of the horse into that tractor.
It's actually shot on the ad that we had to get the horses through a narrow piece and we talking about probably about 50 hectare and we have to get them through a 5 meter spot which is really small. And Ian said to me, will you be able to get them through here? I said yes. And then when I started doing it, I sort of realized that it's gonna go pushy. But I believed in my mind that I can do it. I can get these horses so I understand their body language. I just have to watch their body language to get them to control, to pick out the pack leader as soon as possible so that I can control the pack leader, the alpha mare. And normally if you got the alpha mare and the stallion going in the direction that you got them, then you sort of got the pack going.
So why the horse? If you go back to John Deere's foundations and where John Deere was found in 1837, it all started with a plough. And on the first event where John Deere physically went and showcased this plough to the farmers, there was a horse in front pulling the plough. And that's where the idea came from, using the horse in these videos as well.
And then we got this one chance and they actually went through there and it was like we tried to get another bunch through there but it just was impossible. So because the cameras was hidden all over the place and once a horse has seen something, they very, their survival instinct is basically to watch what's, what's not in nature, what's not in place. And if you, if they notice something, you can do what you want. They will not go there once they figured it out. You will not get them there again. You've got one chance sometimes of a horse to do something like this and you will not get it again. You know, like you don't know what to expect from the outcome of what he's going to do with it and what his idea of the scene is of his story in his head. Because he's a cameraman and he makes stories and I'm a horseman and I just go with what the horse can do today and all that. It came out really good.
If you missed any of the videos, either the 13 episode videos where the horse was hidden or our 8R reveal campaign video with the horse inside, please go follow us on Facebook or on YouTube where all the videos are located under John Deere, Africa.
I've got no fear for a horse, but the gift that I've got, God gave me maybe, but I've got a passion for this. But I practice it and I spend time on it. Just a normal guy with that. Loves horses and riding horses. That's. That's all they are.
