IT'S time to go bananas, because Dorset's Monkey World is returning to our screens in a new series of Monkey Life.

Monkey Life series 12 returns in December, with the much-anticipated catch up of all the rescues and daily dramas at the world’s biggest primate rescue centre.

Based at Monkey World near Bovington, the documentary follows Dr Alison Cronin and her team as she rescues primates in need from around the world and rehabilitates them into groups of their own kind. At the centre, they have a safe, stable home for life.

Nicknamed by staff as “Beast-enders”, the series has won a place in the public’s hearts with its fascinating, and often tragic insight into monkey and ape rescues.

Series 12 introduces us to Hujan, a baby orangutan who joined Monkey World after being rejected by his own mother, births of woolly monkeys and endangered slow loris, and the incredible rescue of a chimpanzee from Thailand which was 15 years in the making.

Filmed over a year, the series takes the viewer on an emotional rollercoaster, from the woolly monkey group celebrating new arrivals, to tense rescue operations, and the daily antics of familiar faces followers of the series will know well.

Monkey Life series 12 will be shown on Freeview channel Pick at 7pm, every Sunday from December 1.