EMERGENCY service crews have found five motorbike riders who are lost in bushland near Wye River, but are yet to rescue them.

Sergeant David Cooper of Lorne Police said a search and rescue helicopter team spotted the men, from Ballarat and aged between 18 and 50, this morning near Mud Track, north-west of Wye River.

Sgt Cooper said the men looked healthy and safe but he said rescuers faced a difficult task to retrieve the men.

“They are split into two groups only a couple of hundred metres apart – they’re all walking,” he said.

“We are looking to get the air wing to drop one rescuer and walk them out to Kennett Road which is a four-wheel-drive track,” Sgt Cooper said.

The men were part of a group of eight riding in the Wye River Valley late yesterday before they got separated and became lost in a steep ravine

A 36-year-old Brookfield man called emergency services and rescuers found him and two other Melton men late yesterday.

Lorne-based emergency service crews searched for the Ballarat men, aged 18, 19, 35, 40 and 50, until dusk yesterday.

The search resumed this morning.