Steve Irwin, Australia’s loudest animal lover, hosts a new six-part series “New Breed Vets” (9 p.m., Animal Planet). The show focuses on doctors in zoos, veterinary hospitals and in the wild – from South Africa to Chicago – who use new technology to treat fish, fowl and four-pawed friends.

In tonight’s premiere, “Vets” travels to Africa with a team of six specialists to tranquilize an elephant from a safe distance, tag the wrinkled critter with a large orange collar, and deliver a battery of shots and tests before the passed-out pachyderm wakes up with a nasty pharmaceutical hangover.

A Chicago team takes a huge Australian grouper from his tank to remove a nasty cancerous growth from the top of his bumpy head. They seal his wound with a substance that looks like glue and return him to the aquarium. A Great horned owl with an uncanny resemblance to a teacher from my junior high school undergoes eye surgery, and seizure-prone California sea lions get EEG and MRI tests. In each of these cases, the application of anesthetics may be the most dangerous part of the procedure. There is great risk that the patient may stop breathing or fail to awake.

While all of this is fascinating stuff, the surgical aspects of “Vets” may be hard viewing for fans of Irwin’s critter features. On the other hand, it’s a lot less grisly than watching lions make a meal of a hapless antelope.

While watching “Vets” I couldn’t help but wonder: who’s paying the health insurance for the walking wounded of the wild kingdom? They seem to get much better care than I do. What’s their deductible?

Tonight’s other highlights

¢ Taylor’s shindig keeps Seth and Summer apart on “The O.C.” (7 p.m., Fox).

¢ Baby-sitting at the laundry on “Everybody Hates Chris” (7 p.m., UPN).

¢ Leo (Harry Connick Jr.) returns on “Will & Grace” (7:30 p.m., NBC). This would be a deeply depressing development if this weren’t the last season of this once-good sitcom.

¢ A police officer may have been shot by his partners on “CSI” (8 p.m., CBS).