A FOUR-year-old girl who survived last night lost on a huge property in central west NSW, got into trouble when she followed pets away from her family home on dusk.

A mammoth air and land search for the little girl ended at 10.30am today when one of her family members riding a motorbike below a police helicopter spotted her in bushland 1.2km away from her home.

Moments later she was is the arms of her distraught mother at a jubilant command centre near the house.

“The mother has been beside herself as you can in again all night,” Oberon State Emergency Service controller Craig Gibbons said.

“Once she saw her little girl it was a pretty emotional get together.

“For a lot of us who were here all night and quite tired, and thinking about our own families at home, it was a little bit emotional to be able to say we’ve found her safe and well.”

Suffering only mild dehydration and prickles in her feet, the girl was taken to Bathurst Base Hospital for a brief health assessment.

The girl had been missing since 7.30pm last night, when she wandered off on the 5000-acre property.

Chifley Local Area Command led the remarkable search operation involving more than 50 emergency services crews and teams of local residents who spent last night wading through a number of dams on the property, fearing the girl had drowned.

“To be honest that was our real great concern, that she had wondered into a dam,” Chifley Local Area Command Crime Manager, detective chief inspector Luke Rankin said.

“From the conversations we’ve had with her, what we believed happened is she’s followed some dogs away from the house.

“I was here at the command post when the child was brought back on the motorcycle by the person who had found her and the feeling was electric, it was a really special moment.

“We don’t always get good outcomes with these things.”