Watch Orphans of the Wild

Early morning, the first day. A convoy of vehicles and trailers with the seven cheetahs and one leopard leave Naankuse for a six-hour drive to Sandfontein, a private reserve in the far south of Namibia. These animals have been looked after at Naankuse and over the next few days they will be released back into the wild. As they proceed the landscape changes, becoming more mountainous. Rudie, Marlice, Zacheo and little Nicklai take off from Windhoek International Airport for the two-hour flight to

Seven cheetahs and one leopard that had been in the care of Marlice and Rudie will be released back into the wild. All these have to be caught and darted, collared and given medical check ups - in one day! Before starting with the operation Marlice puts the caracal that had a leg operation in a bigger enclosure - she is recovering fast and will also be released soon. Starting with the big operation Marlice, Kate and Flo set a capture cage for Boris, one of the cheetahs, they then join the rest o

One of the cheetahs at Naankuse is not eating well and Marlice suspects it is because of tooth trouble. She and Rudie take the cheetah to Dr Ian Baines, the vet in Windhoek. X-rays reveal that she indeed has a tooth problem, and it is serious - if they cant fix it she might have to be put down. During a four-hour operation the rotten toot is removed and she has a good change of surviving. Marlice and Rudie take the caracal that had the leg operation back to Naankuse and inspect the leg. The woun

Three of the baby baboons have reached the age where they can start breeding and Marlice decides they need to be castrated as she doesnt want them to breed in captivity. She and Rudie differ on how to sedate the baboons - she beliefs they should catch and then inject them, Rudie feels they should simply dart the three baboons. Funny moments as they play off against each other. Finally, Rudie wins, they dart the baboons and take them to the clinic where Rudie, with Marlices help perform the opera

One of the wild dogs has a snakebite wound that doesnt heal. Marlice and Rudie dart her and take her to their clinic where a biopsy is taken and her general condition checked. When putting her back with the rest of the pack they have to be careful - if she is too drowsy the other dogs might see it as a sign of weakness and kill her. A caracal with a broken leg arrives at Naankuse and they take her to a vet in Windhoek where X-rays are taken. Dr Ian Baines operate on her with Rudie assisting - Ma

While looking for the three caracals that hadnt been seen for about three weeks Kiewiet finds suspicious looking human tracks and traces of blood in the veldt - possibly that of a poacher. He immediately alerts Marlice and they, together with Rudie and Flo investigate. They are sure that it is that of a poacher and Rudie, Kiewiet and Flo do a stakeout from a watchtower during the night. When nothing turns up they decide to pick up and follow the tracks the next morning. The tracks lead them to a

We meet Nicklai, Rudie and Marlices five month-old son. Zacheo now goes to school in Windhoek and goes there by bus. Umbili and Shakira have grown quite a bit and were moved to a bigger enclosure, Marlice still feeds them daily before checking up on the wild dogs. The pack is now nearly fully grown - one has a snakebite wound that is not healing and Marlice decides what to do. The meerkats now also have a litter of eleven and encounter a pufadder at the enclosures - Frank and Violet teaches thei

We look back at when Umbili and Shakira arrived as baby cubs. Marlice introduces baby baboons to the juveniles. After we meet meerkats, Marlice takes two tame cheetahs for a walk.

Due to threatening poaching problems Marlice and Rudie decide to move three lions into a leopard enclosure and the leopards from that enclosure into the lion enclosure. They first dart the two leopards, take blood samples and put them in holding cages - without a glitch. Because the three lions are aggressive and at the same time very suspicious it is important that all three have to be darted at exactly the same moment - at the sound of a dart gun they will simply disappear into the thickets. M

Of all the animals at Naankuse baboons make up the majority and are divided into three groups, adults, juveniles and babies. Marlice visits and interacts with the adults, introduces us to some of them and explains their intricate social structure. They then go for a walk in the veldt - a valuable excursion as they climb trees, play, forage for food and groom each other - and Marlice! After the walk she introduces us to the juvenile group and explains their hierarchy. The smaller animals like the

Marlice gets a call from a reserve in the south of Namibia where they had released a collared leopard a couple of months before. They have since lost the signal and dont know what had happened to the animal. Marlice decides to take Kiewiet, an expert Bushman tracker, to the reserve and look for it on foot. Before leaving she first checks in on Lucky, a three-legged cheetah that acts as a foster mother to orphaned cheetah cubs. We are introduced to Lucky and three cubs. After fetching Kiewiet, Ma

Early morning, one of the baby baboons, Gus, wakes up with Marlice, Rudie and Zacheo - in their bed! Here he gets his first bottle of the day after which Marlice takes him to the main enclosures. Marlice and Jo take him and the other babies for their daily walk. During the walk they get exercise, climb trees, play with each other and forage for food - just like they would in the wild. Arriving back at the enclosures Marlice and Jo prepares the babys bottles and feed them. Ore, the bat-eared fox

In an early morning breakfast scene we are introduced to Marlices family - Rudie, her husband, and Zacheo, their sun. After breakfast Zacheo helps Marlice to carry the litter of 14 African Wild Dog pups from the house where they had spent the night to an enclosure on the lawn. Here they are weighed and micro-chipped. Zacheo leaves for school where he meets up with his Bushman friends. A new orphaned baby baboon with a foot injury arrives at Naankuse and Marlice treats her in the clinic after whi