Two ripe tomatoes offered as reward in hunt for doll abductor

Two dolls have been abducted from the side of the Stuart Highway in Australia's Northern Territory, prompting a reward of two ripe home-grown tomatoes for information leading to their recovery. Sixty wooden bollards at a lay-by outside Palmerston were dressed as peg dolls, with decorated paper-plate faces and individual stitched clothing, by guerrilla artists on Thursday night.

But "Ted" and "Amy" were noticed missing at 6pm that day. Guerrilla artist Peta Smith said the dolls were stolen. "The first thing one of our girls did was scream and say 'Ted and Amy are gone'," Ms Smith, from Howard Springs, said. "We took them down and next time we are going to have a security guard. Definitely there's someone out there who knows something and I'll give a reward."

And the reward will be rich. "They might be two tomatoes out of my garden," she said. "There's a really big reward because I haven't had tomatoes recently," she added. "As good-looking as Amy is, there have been suggestions they've eloped. But Ted's an important member of his family. He wouldn't leave the kids behind. His wife is an angel."

Ms Smith said the angels had very distinctive features. "Ted is obviously male with a good beard," she said. "Ted was in his pajamas. That would be awkward for him. Amy had long pink hair and wings, with an Australian gum nut frock." Ms Smith said the peg dolls were an interpretation of clothes-peg dolls she made as a child, and the wooden bollards had long been tempting her.