After years spent honing their veterinary practice and making appearances on local news, Hodges and Ferguson got the attention of a Nat Geo WILD network looking to mix up its nature storytelling.
“(A producer from Nat Geo WILD) was like, ‘do you guys Skype?’ I said, ‘Nah, what am I going to Skype for?’ We live in the country. Everybody I know, I can just go see,” Hodges says. “I then made the phone call to Doctor Ferguson and told him we had a possibility for a TV show. There was a little silence and then he said ‘whatever your antics are, I’m rolling with you.’ Those were literally his words.”
“I thought he was just joking because you’re talking about a television show,” Ferguson says. We’re South of Atlanta. (TV shows) are for people in Atlanta, not for us country boys.”
But the country boys got their TV show all the same. Now they are set on using the opportunity to dispel some myths about the South and rural veterinary medicine.
“(People think) the medicine that we practice is old, antiquated, and that’s not the case. (Critter Fixers) will show that we practice quality medicine,” Ferguson says. “We have the same tools. We have ultrasounds, x-rays, endoscopy, all the same things that we practice there. I think for some people, their perception is that we don’t or can’t do it like they do it in the city.”