THE social habits of emus inspired the winning entrant for Burrumbuttock's Farm Art in the Bush competition.
Chiltern artist Helen Hay's entry featured old man Owen standing guard alongside juvenile Eddie and hatchling Harry having just broken out of his egg.
"Because it is a native garden I tried to make something that fitted in and I'm always amazed by the whole emu story of the male looking after the eggs while the female wanders off to look for another partner," Ms Hay said.
She thought she would lose to Urana artist Andrew Whitehead who won the people's choice award with his kangaroo.
Gerogery's Tim Haberman collected the budding artist award for his rabbit, while the runners-up in the under-18 category were Balldale brothers Aaron and Ryan Ballentine who made a plane.
An estimated 500 people saw the sculptures over the weekend.
