Surprisingly, and perhaps shockingly, no nature series has gone the way of NatGeo’s “Queens,” which focuses exclusively on matriarchies and female leaders in the animal kingdom from around the world.

“When we began, we looked around thinking, ‘Surely this has been done. It’s such an obvious subject area.’ Yet it is genuinely first,” said executive producer Vanessa Berlowitz.

“That’s partly because science is possibly focused a little bit more on the male behaviors. They’re easier to study and, actually for filmmakers, often easier to film because it tends to be a bit more dramatic, showing teeth and claws and fighting. Male dominance is quite demonstrative.

“I’ve worked,” said this veteran in a Zoom from London, “on big series like ‘Planet Earth’ and ‘Frozen Planet’ that have always been very male-dominated. I was one woman among many men.

“So in ‘Queens’ to be in a female-led production over four years where people were collaborative and sharing was singular.  We had to lean in because we had young moms with new babies who would normally just drop out of the workforce.

“But we kept them in because they were talented. And we just found ways to make it work.”

“Queens,” vividly narrated by Angela Bassett, has seven episodes, each showcasing one species. From the peace-loving bonobos of the Congo basin to the elephants of the Savanna, the series breaks new ground with eye-popping examples of success and heartbreak.

“To capture female strategy,” Berlowitz explained, “requires you to really understand the characters and examine their relationships. That requires a lot of time in the field and a lot of concentration on these individuals working out who’s playing off who.

“The thing that astonished me was not only the amount of new storyline and new dramas and unexpected things — like we filmed the first-ever hyena infanticide in the Bora Bora crater, which no one knew they do.

“But also the subtlety of the politicking that was going on. It’s like, Wow! It’s quite a complicated social world that these females are operating in.

“And that just surprised me at every turn. I’ve been working on this a long time — it’s quite hard to surprise me. I know I’m quite tough when the (footage) comes back. It’s like, Okay, this has really got to be special because we have filmed some of these species before.

“And time and time again there was new revelatory behavior coming back.”

Among the episodes are grizzly bears, orcas, baboons and Ethiopian wolves, African lions and hyenas – “Their story is the power of sisterhood.”

“Bonobos? “They’re a bit like chimpanzees. They’re our closest living relatives and this is the first time they’ve ever been filmed.”

“Queens” premiere March 4 on NatGeo and streams the next day on Disney+ and Hulu.