Reader Christine Mott-Carbonare of Munster contacted me this week asking for an update about one of our Region’s “wildest” TV personality claim-to-fames who has always retained her local roots.

“I caught on Facebook last week you had Dr. Michelle Oakley from the reality series ‘Dr. Oakley, Yukon Vet’ on your WJOB ‘Of Notoriety’ radio show and I missed it,” Mott-Carbonare lamented.

“I love her! I met her a few years ago when she came back to the Region for an event at Munster High School, as one of their famous alums. Is she going to continue her show after this new season?”

I have good news, and more good news for Christine and other fans of our Northwest Indiana’s animal expert-turned-Alaskan TV star and her hit cable National Geographic Channel series “Dr. Oakley, Yukon Vet.”

First, you can always catch the rebroadcasts of my weekly radio interview show “Of Notoriety” on my Facebook page or the WJOB Facebook page or the station’s website. Second, Dr. Oakley’s ninth season premiered just a few weeks ago in March and when she did last week’s Zoom radio interview outside (with her dog Bindi at her side in snowy 20-degree temps), she confirmed she is joining her family to start filming the series’ 10th anniversary season.

Veterinarian Dr. Michelle Oakley, who is a 1987 graduate of Munster High School, launched her reality TV career on the series when it was unveiled in Spring 2014. An adventuress and friend to both feathered and four-legged friends from her home near the Alaska border, she is shadowed by television cameras for her series, which airs on Nat Geo Wild Network and can now be seen with all of the previously archived seasons on the Disney+ streaming service.

Airing on Saturday nights, Season 9 of “Dr. Oakley, Yukon Vet” premiered on March 13 with an episode featuring an aggressive wolverine that needed medical attention because of a lump on its side. Other aired episodes in recent weeks have included a reindeer with a bellyache, a wolf with an eye ailment, a starving bison and an older horse with dental concerns.

The hour-long episodes of the reality show blend her family time at home and her veterinarian duties based in Haines Junction in the Yukon Territory, as well as running a satellite clinic 150 miles away and serving as the “on-call vet,” often arriving by helicopter, for the Yukon Wildlife Preserve, which is about an hour away from her home. She has called Canada her home since 1992, with her husband, Shane Oakley, and their three daughters, Willow, Maya and Sierra.

While older daughters Maya and Sierra have embraced life in front of lights and cameras, Dr. Oakley said youngest daughter Willow, now a teen, is less enthusiastic about reality stardom and has opted for less camera time.

Dr. Oakley’s father Steve died in November 2018 at age 76, but her mother Georgia Plantinga still lives in Schererville.

“I know Michelle often mentions spending summers on her uncle’s dairy farm in Cedar Lake, but I think she also gained some of her tenderness for animals from my mother in Hammond who was always taking in stray cats and kittens to find them homes,” Georgia told me when we chatted this week.

“Growing up, she and her brother Scott, who lives in California now, always had pets from mice to a snake and also a beloved cat named Big Boy, who began life as a feral cat.”

Georgia and Dr. Oakley admit they haven’t had much family-reunion time because of the distance and the pandemic.

“A while back, I did join Michelle and the family for a visit with them up north, and I spent time with them on location while they were filming,” Georgia said.

“We were way north of Anchorage and during filming we traveled by caravan in vehicles communicating only by walkie-talkies. It was all very cloak-and-dagger, and very interesting to see everything it takes even before the cameras start rolling.”

For more information, visit www.nationalgeographic.com/tv/shows/dr-oakley-yukon-vet/episode-guide/season-9

Philip Potempa is a journalist, published author and the director of marketing at Theatre at the Center. He can be reached at pmpotempa@comhs.org.