Narrator: But for these cubs to survive... Djenguet: One of Matho's cubs is going to get hurt... worse...killed.

Narrator: They'll need the protection of the whole pride.

[Growls] [Squeals] The Okavango Delta in Botswana.

Djenguet: The Okavango Delta just--it's a perfect place.

Narrator: And it's a stronghold for Africa's big cats: lion... cheetah... and leopard.

♪ Here, a team of local and international wildlife filmmakers is working together to record the cats' lives like never before.

♪ They'll follow individual big cats for 6 months... Dimitriadis: Ah!

Narrator: They're capturing the cats' behavior... Buchanan: Whoa!

Narrator: Vianet is with new mum Matho and her cubs.

Djenguet: Even if you are the most complex person on this planet, just seeing those cubs, that changes completely everything.

They just look no different to our domestic cat at this very stage.

[Low growling] Ah, beautiful!

Narrator: Lionesses give birth away from the pride to keep their newborns safe.

She was spotted by the team earlier this year with a cub, but that was the only sighting.

So we presume he died.

Djenguet The good news is, Matho has given it another go, and this time she's got 3 of them.

Narrator: Under 3 months old, this is a critical time in the cubs' lives.

Djenguet: A life of a lion cub, it's unbelievably fragile.

Only 1 in 5 will make it to adulthood.

Narrator: Lionesses usually raise their cubs together in a nursery group known as a creche.

Djenguet: And they are so vulnerable, so vulnerable at this point because they rely so much on their mother and also vulnerable to any predator.

Narrator: Creching increases cubs' survival by over 25%, but Matho's litter is much younger than the other cubs in the pride.

Djenguet: This sort of creching dynamic would be really difficult for her.

She's completely out of sync with other females and their cubs, who are so much bigger than her cubs.

And it can be easily injured if not killed, by their own friends and family members.

It's gonna be tough for her and for the cubs.

♪ Narrator: The "Big Cats" team is covering 150 square miles of the Okavango Delta.

The annual flood is drying up, and it's growing hotter by the day.

♪ All right, let's go.

Narrator: The team is living alongside Africa's wildlife.

♪ It's gonna be a clash [indistinct].

♪ [Grunting] ♪ [Growling] Bestelink: You just want to be slow and not cause too much excitement.

Narrator: But two 5-ton bull elephants could easily flip a vehicle.

♪ Narrator: Xudum the leopard is pregnant and her cubs are due any day.

Such a clever cat.

How can you not get attached to such a beautiful animal with such personality?

♪ Narrator: She's running out of time to catch a meal before she gives birth.

Bestelink: She's using this bull elephant to disguise a sound and her movement.

♪ Just shows you how forward-thinking and decisive they are.

Quite exceptional kit.

♪ Narrator: It's more than 100 degrees in the scorching midday sun.

I mean, this is--this is by no means, you know, normal behavior.

♪ Narrator: At Matho's den, Rea is following the new family.

To Brinke: It's not such a easy job for a lioness, raising some cubs.

Narrator: With no creche to help her, she must do everything for her cubs alone.

♪ To Brinke: She's got to keep coming back to the cubs, letting them suckle for milk.

And at the same time, your usual job of hunting continues.

Narrator: Without other lionesses to babysit, Matho leaves the cubs unattended to find food.

[Low growling] [Mews] To Brinke: It's one of the most critical periods in cubs' life now.

Matho has not introduced them to the pride, so she doesn't have that extra protection from the other pride members.

And when she's not present, they have to fend for themselves.

Narrator: Matho has kept her cubs well-hidden until now.

♪ But the other pride mothers and their cubs have just found her den.

To Brinke: We've got Nosi, Magogo, and Mmakgosi incoming, along with Big Boy Mathata and the rest of the Cubs here.

Narrator: At 8 months old, Mathata is much bigger than Matho's cubs.

You can just see how interested all the cubs are right now.

It's potentially their first time that they've ever seen their new cousins here.

They keep tapping them on their heads, on the body, looking for a reaction.

They don't realize how small and tender these new cubs are.

[Growling] Mathata and the older cubs, they're playing too rough.

One of Matho's cubs is going to get hurt...or worse, killed.

♪ [Growling] Mathata doesn't even realize what he's doing.

[Squealing] Mmakgosi, Magogo, Nosi, they're doing nothing.

Not sure if they fully realize what's happening, how violent this play has turned into.

♪ Narrator: The other pride mothers decide to leave.

♪ To Brinke: Matho's cubs seem to be all right.

I mean, at the end of all of that trauma uh, at least Matho's cubs get to live another day.

Matho's cubs are still too small to be kept in this creche.

She must continue to raise them single-handed...for now.

To Brinke: So, it just shows how hard it is for Matho or any other lioness, if you have to raise your cubs alone.

[Squeaking] ♪ Narrator: Xudum the leopard is hunting again.

Woodward: It's becoming very, very critical that she makes a kill and actually gets a feed.

♪ To Brinke: It's a very good hunting opportunity for Xudum right now.

We've got the impala walking through these thick bushes.

I see one female who's close there now.

Woodward: A jump is always dangerous, but now that she's pregnant, it's even riskier.

She could get hurt, but she can't afford to go hungry any longer.

This means she can den, she can relax for a bit, and she doesn't have to stress.

♪ And less than 100 yards away, Gordon is with the hungry lion mothers.

Buchanan: Xudum has just caught an impala under the tree and the lions have heard it and they are bombing their way.

This is--this is gonna be very interesting.

♪ [Growling] ♪ Buchanan: This is an amazing win for these mums-- Nosi, Mmakgosi, Magogo-- but it is quite unfortunate for poor Xudum.

[Crunching] I really feel for our newest mum-to-be Xudum.

Woodward: This is just gonna make her life so much more difficult.

This is really, really gut-wrenching.

♪ Narrator: With so many lions in the area... Anna and Greg are devising a new strategy for finding the Okavango's most elusive big cat.

Dimitriadis: We are heading out on a cheetah search further west than we've ever been before.

We are right on the western edge of the Delta.

Just beyond that treeline, there's nothing but sand-- hundreds of miles.

It's exactly the kind of area the cheetahs love to hunt.

♪ Yeah, it certainly does scream "cheetah," this area.

[Man speaking indistinctly over radio] Dimitriadis: This place is beautiful.

It's completely different.

It's so green, and there is so much cheetah food about.

We've got zebras, tsessebes, wildebeests, lechwes, baboons.

It's just chockablock packed.

♪ Narrator: But after 4 hours of searching... Dimitriadis: Whoa.

Narrator: The Okavango Delta is home to nearly 700 lions.

The team has run into an entirely new pride.

Dimitriadis: We know that cheetah do not hang around lions, so this is not good news.

We're gonna have to move basically as far away from these lions as we can and, uh, yeah, start our search again.

♪ [Growling] Narrator: Matho's cubs are growing in confidence and becoming more active.

Djenguet: One is already exploring.

Narrator: It's now harder to leave them alone, as they could wander off.

Djenguet: It might seem like a great thing to have so many cubs, but it creates a lot of pressure.

Matho is a strong and experienced female, but I think she's struggling to keep up with the demand of supplying milk and finding a meal for herself.

♪ It must be hard to be a solo mom, having to hunt and provide all by herself.

♪ Anything at all could predate on tiny little lions.

Narrator: It's becoming more vital than ever that she finds other lionesses to help her.

♪ After covering more than 60 miles... Dimitriadis: Wow... Narrator: Anna's new approach looks to have finally paid off.

♪ Dimitriadis: I can see some ears, and I don't want to speak too soon, but I think it's a cheetah.

The only thing I can think is that this is possibly Lesego.

♪ I remember Brad mentioning this female that's got 3 cubs.

And that is around the time when they start to disperse and leave.

It's absolutely incredible that Lesego has managed to bring up 3 cubs to adulthood, when you consider that only 1 in 10 survive.

And that's mainly because the mom, being the single parent that she is, has to go out and hunt for them.

And that means leaving the cubs behind at a den, opening them up to the risk of being killed by other predators.

And now I can see quite clearly that there are two boys here, and I think-- yeah, the other one's a girl.

Oh!

Seeing them move together, they're like a solid unit.

They're almost moving as one.

♪ You know, I just really can't get over how incredibly adaptable cheetah are.

We've had a huge fire sweep through Xudum Island and take out almost half the vegetation.

And then we had that incredible flood that's come in and it's created mad swamplands.

Just seeing this family in front of me demonstrates how no matter what the Delta throws at these cheetahs, they will always find a way.

Narrator: After losing her kill to the lions... Bestelink: This is a better place for her, be kind of out of the line... central area.

Narrator: Xudum is leading Brad to an area he suspects is her den.

She's very skinny.

So there's a chance that she's, uh, she's already had her cubs.

Now we have cubs making noises, so there's confirmation they are in here.

♪ Following her for almost 5 years now, and this is the second litter.

We saw her lose the first.

And this is an opportunity for her to become a successful mother.

I mean, that's all that these cats ever want to be.

[Animals calling] ♪ Narrator: Hoping to glimpse inside the den, Brad is deploying the thermal camera.

[Mewing] Narrator: Leopards keep their cubs concealed at birth.

These cubs are 4 days old... not even.

Narrator: They've rarely ever been filmed this young.

These are incredibly private, unique little moments.

I've spent most of my adult life with leopards, and I've never seen this kind of activity in the den before.

I've been waiting almost 2 years for this since she lost her last one.

[Squawking] Narrator: The cubs' eyes are still closed, but sensing their mother, they call out for milk.

Bestelink: As soon as a cub starts making too much noise, she's got to pick them up and reposition them.

She's got to keep them quiet.

Narrator: Xudum must keep her cubs hidden from any predators nearby.

She really just doesn't want them to be making a noise and drawing any attention to the den or to the young cubs.

She will be having to hunt and get enough nourishment so that she can produce the milk that these two little guys need.

[Squealing] ♪ Narrator: Starting her night shift, Anna is following the lions.

Narrator: Matho is still searching for a creche... [Dimitriadis speaking indistinctly] Narrator: and is moving her cubs under the cover of darkness.

♪ [Growling] These cubs are gonna have to tread very carefully.

♪ We just watched my Matho and two of her cubs move off, and she's left behind her little one.

And it's currently just unsure what to do with itself.

So I am getting really concerned for this little one.

I'm hoping that mum realizes her mistake soon and comes back, because it's not a safe place for it to be.

♪ ♪ [Barking] Jackal.

[Barking] [Barking] Could be potentially a very horrible situation.

♪ The cub has been taking itself further into a bush.

Narrator: Lions have advanced spatial memory and can use it to retrace their steps.

Narrator: But the longer the cub is alone, the less likely it is to survive.

We'll see whether Mama makes an appearance in the sunlight.

♪ Narrator: Relieving Anna, Gordon is taking over to keep an eye on the cub.

Buchanan: We don't know where Matho is at the moment.

There was quite a lot of movement last night and not a lot of prey in this area, so that the big danger is that Matho shifts her focus towards finding food, which will push this little cub further in her, sort of in her memory.

I've never seen this before.

You know, lions will leave their cubs in random locations, but they do that intentionally so they can go off and hunt.

This is a mistake... just to leave one cub in one place and move on with the rest of them.

Narrator: The cub is avoiding detection by staying silent.

Buchanan: But the danger is that when it gets hungry, it might start calling.

♪ The only hope is that Matho realizes that she's missing one cub and she remembers pretty much everywhere that she went last night.

You just go up there and you find somewhere that you can tuck yourself away.

As night approaches, there's still no sign of Matho.

If it goes into the tall grass, we're never gonna know what happened to it.

Narrator: The cub has disappeared into thick cover.

Dunno.

I think just the only thing we can do is get the thermal imaging camera up and see if we can get a heat source and look into the deeper bush.

♪ With this camera, anything hot is gonna show up.

So, I'm hoping that we can just peer into these trees, see through them, and pick up the movement.

♪ This club has made the second mistake.

The first was to not follow its mum in the first place, and the second is to actually just keep moving.

If you get lost, just stay where you are and we'll come and find you.

♪ Oh, where did you go?

[Starts engine] [Animals calling] Narrator: At the leopard's den, Xudum is still going hungry.

Woodward: Xudum hasn't had a meal since she gave birth.

She has to leave her cubs alone in the den to go out and hunt.

[Mewing] Narrator: Leaving her newborn cubs unprotected is risky... [Starts engine] but if she doesn't eat soon, she won't be able to produce enough milk to keep them alive.

Woodward: I haven't seen her made a proper kill in a long time.

The last kill that I saw her make was stolen by lions.

It'd be nice to see her get a kill and really know that she is actually surviving and providing for her family.

♪ I mean, it's pitch black right now, but there's no wind, so any movement she makes, they might hear her, um...

She's got them walking straight towards her currently.

♪ So, this impala's standing here just by the edge of the tree.

♪ All it takes is for one of these impala to suddenly decide that they want to go that way, and then all hell is gonna break loose.

Narrator: It's an alarm call to alert the rest of the herd.

Unsuccessful, but it was a pretty good effort for her, I have to admit.

She's just having such a run of bad luck at the moment.

Narrator: For Xudum and her cubs, the situation is now becoming critical.

Woodward: She's going to struggle to keep the cubs alive if she doesn't feed herself soon.

♪ Narrator: Gordon is still looking for Matho's lost cub.

♪ [Starts engine] This little guy has moved at quite a pace out from the cover.

This doesn't look good.

The only hope that this cub has is if Matho comes back.

Nighttime is a dangerous place for a lion cub this small-- hyenas, leopards, other lions.

♪ [Crying] ♪ Oh, I'm hoping he's not making another mistake.

Narrator: Matho has retraced her steps back to her lost cub.

Buchanan: That is incredible!

[Squeaking] I didn't have any hopes for this--this cub.

Almost 24 hours alone, and this cub has been reunited with its siblings and its mum.

Narrator: There's even more new life within the lion pride.

[Low growling] I can't believe Tsebe's has got five cubs.

Generally, litters are between 2 and 3 cubs.

Narrator: This could be the creche that Matho needs.

Narrator: She's bringing her family to meet the newest pride members.

♪ This would be the first time the triplets meet Tsebe and Naledi's cubs.

I think they know Auntie Matho is coming up with the triplets.

[Low growling] For Matho to creche and synchronize her cubs with Naledi and Tsebe, it's much safer because they're slightly younger.

♪ One of my Matho's cubs is suckling from Naledi... and one's suckling from Tsebe.

This is great.

Narrator: Lions are the only cats that raise cubs together.

By feeding Matho's cubs, Tsebe and Naledi are accepting her into the fold.

Djenguet: And this is, I believe, where the creching between the 3 mothers who start...which is exciting!

♪ I'm hopeful because Matho is gone now Naledi and Tsebe.

Those can become a strong bond, a strong coalition.

This coalition of the 3 mothers seems to be working.

♪ Narrator: On another night shift... Gordon is in Xudum the leopard's territory.

Buchanan: Male leopards are one of the biggest threats to leopard cubs.

There's a huge risk if a male leopard is not the father of those cubs.

He would try to wipe them out, try to kill them.

Narrator: It's not long before his meal-- Buchanan: Hang on a second.

Narrator: attracts the attention of a younger male: Metsi.

Buchanan: Metsi doesn't have a clearly defined territory at the moment, so he'll just be moving around, looking for somewhere to set up home.

Narrator: Most leopards here are killed by their own species.

Buchanan: There is a zero tolerance policy between these-- these leopard males.

They're highly territorial animals.

This unknown male definitely looks bigger in size.

♪ If it came to blows, I really don't fancy Metsi's chances at all.

♪ He's using his superior strength and size to try and intimidate Metsi, just shepherding him out.

♪ The last thing that either of these cats want to do is to have a fight, for it to be, you know, teeth and claws.

He's stopped on the ground, looking pretty confident, that he's actually seen Metsi off.

♪ It's he's just used this little bit of wind and the darkness to sneak round.

He's gone a big loop.

He's left the other meal out on the plains, and he's snuck in just to--to feed on this kill.

His persistence... has paid off... and he's getting his prize.

♪ The other male is fast asleep out there.

If you want to keep your dinner all to yourself, don't take a nap.

Narrator: It's a win for Metsi.

But with these males now in play, for Xudum, the game has changed.

♪ Brad is checking in on Xudum.

Bestelink: Starting to get a bit concerned about this.

Narrator: Since giving birth, she's been struggling to feed herself.

Bestelink: I know she's been having a--a rough time, carcasses being stolen by lions, and it's just not great.

She can be around the den, keeping an eye on her cubs and being an attentive mother.

So, relieved to see her full and happy and spending time with her cubs.

♪ Yeah, that's a good feeling, very good feeling.

♪ I'm just amazed at how trusting and accepting she is of us.

[Stops engine] ♪ Hello, you cute things.

[Squeaking] Just seeing a bum and little feet in the air... [Sighs] it's super exciting.

[Crying] There are two little babies.

[Crying] ♪ You could actually see both of the two cubs.

♪ There's a huge size difference between the two cubs.

My best guess would be little boy, little girl.

♪ Little girl is moving around and she's in the front.

And the boy, I think, is at the back, much more stationary, slightly bigger.

Females mature quicker.

and her eyes are open already and she's smaller, she's more active, and the male is quite, uh, quite slow.

Eyes still closed, still head wobbling, less active.

♪ So, this is the first day that we've managed to get a little look inside the den while the sun is up, and just picking bits and pieces of the two interacting and climbing over each other, and start to see the personalities and start to see character.

[Crying] And it's like one big happy family.

There could be nothing better with this picture right now.

[Crying] Narrator: Heading back to camp, something catches Brad's eye.

We got male tracks here, coming down the road towards the den.

This is not--not great.

♪ Narrator: Male leopards will kill cubs that are not their own to eliminate competition.

[Exhales] It's not good to have tracks so close to this den.

The male leopard tracks are going back and forth, way too close to newborn cubs.

♪ ♪ "Big Cats 24/7" is available with PBS Passport and on Amazon Prime Video ♪