The AFC Conservation Artist Award is awarded monthly to honour a member for outstanding artistic talent and extraordinary contribution to the conservation cause. At the end of each year, a prior recipient of the monthly honour is selected for the annual Simon Combes Conservation Award.

The Simon Combes Conservation Award was created by the AFC in February 2005 to honour Combes' memory. Combes, world-renowned painter, author, instructor and dedicated conservationist, was tragically killed by a charging Cape Buffalo while hiking near his home in Kenya on December 12, 2004.  At the time, Combes was the Director of the Kenya chapter of the Rhino Rescue Trust (www.rhinorescue.org), an organization founded in 1985 to protect endangered species from poachers and to help the communities surrounding Lake Nakuru National Park affected by wildlife conflicts.   As this is the first year for the award, the first recipient has yet to be selected.

For many years Peta acted as a foster carer for injured and orphaned native Australian birds and marsupials and was a member of a local wildlife carer's group, Wilvos. Peta is a member of the Mooloolah Rivers Waterwatch and Landcare Inc. and has donated framed, limited edition giclee prints for fundraising. She has also donated framed prints to other Landcare organizations and selected conservation groups.
Peta is also a member of Birds Australia (RAOU) and donates a percentage of sales from many of her paintings to this organization. Nature in the Raw, is a group of nature artists promoting Australian Flora and Fauna in which she is also a member.

A childhood spent in Papua New Guinea and a lifelong love of wildlife were the twin catalysts for Peta's commitment to her art. Peta currently lives on Queensland's Sunshine Coast on a small acreage in Mooloolah Valley. For many years she has acted as a wildlife foster carer; caring for injured, orphaned and sick native marsupials and birds.

Peta's love of caring for some of the smaller species of birds is also reflected in her art. A self-taught artist, working mainly in gouache, her paintings of wrens, finches, robins and the smaller honeyeaters are extremely popular and her work is in private collections both in Australia and overseas.

After a successful joint exhibition with fellow wildlife artist, Lyn Ellison, the two collaborated to co-author and illustrate the book "Wild About You - Friends With Feathers." The book is a collection of short stories about some of the wild birds the artists had cared for.

In 2005 Peta was fortunate enough to travel to Namibia with Lyn and her husband horticulturist Don Ellison and cultural artist Judy Scotchford. They hired a car and spent three weeks travelling, amassing an enormous amount of reference material between them. In 2007 Peta travelled again to Africa. This time to Tanzania. It is from these trips that Peta has started painting African mammals and larger birds, as well as the smaller birds that she still enjoys painting so much.

Passionate about Australian Native flora and fauna, Peta will take any opportunity to educate and inform others of the beauty in Australia and has spent many hours at the local school talking with the children. A keen gardener, she has planted most of the acreage that she lives on with Australian native plants. Many of the plants are endemic to the area in an attempt to "bring back the wildlife". At present there are two pairs of rainbow lorikeets nesting in the boxes supplied for them, a family of ringtail possums live permanently in the trees by the house and a Satin Bowerbird has built a bower, decorating it with an assortment of blue and green objects. Each morning he also adds some fresh flowers that he has picked from in the garden.

View more previous winners:

• 2006 Conservation Artist Award Winners
• 2005 Conservation Artist Award Winners
• 2004 Conservation Artist Award Winners