One of TV's most endearing and unlikely reality show stars is Dr. Jan Pol.
He's a veterinarian with a country practice in mid-Michigan, near Mount Pleasant.
He is also the star of the National Geographic Wild series The Incredible Dr. Pol. The show begins its fifth season Saturday.
Pol is telling his story in a new autobiography Never Turn Your Back on an Angus Cow: My Life as a Country Vet.
He says he learned the lesson to never turn your back on an Angus cow the hard way when he was growing up on a dairy farm in the Netherlands.
“You don’t turn your back. You cannot outrun the cow. You cannot outrun the horse. You cannot outrun almost every animal on the planet.”
Pol opened his veterinarian practice in 1981. In his more than three decades of practicing in Michigan, he has seen big changes in farming in the state.
“When we started here, there were two or three family farms every mile. Those have disappeared. Farms got bigger, but it doesn’t mean cows got better care,” says Pol.
* Listen to our conversation with Dr. Jan Pol above.
