Spooky shrunken heads buried in the garden? No, they’re just seed pods, says expert

No-one wants to make a grizzly discovery at the bottom of their garden, especially when it comes in the shape of four tiny shrunken heads.Luckily for Nasreem Khan these miniature skulls were harmless seed pods rather than human remains.

Miss Khan had been making the most of the unseasonal sunshine by doing a spot of gardening when she dug up the skull-like objects attached to a stalk.Not only did they bear and startling resemblance to human heads, they came complete with tiny teeth.She was so terrified by the unusual discovery that she ran straight to a neighbour's house."I was just doing a bit of tidying up when I came across this strange thing," said Nasreem."It is so bizarre I just can't get over it."

"I have to admit it spooked me a bit, I wasn't quite sure what I had come across but it was a little frightening."What I saw were four perfectly formed tiny skulls attached to a stalk."I rushed around to my neighbour's house saying I had found a skull plant. She didn't know what I was talking about until I showed her."The mystery has been solved by Dr Ian Rotherham, who directs the Tourism and Environmental Change Research Unit at Sheffield Hallam University.He said: "Bizarre as it appears it is nothing to worry about. What Nasreem found was a seed head and I think it could be Aquilegia."It is more commonly known as Columbine and is perfectly harmless."
Not only are the freaky little faces, which were unearthed in Sheffield, perfectly innocent, but the seed pod is apparently quite a common feature in the average garden."It's not a common plant in the wild but it is often found in domestic gardens," added Dr. Rotherham. "It does look a bit sinister, like shrunken heads."