A post mortem examination of a human head found at a quarry in Mepal, Cambridgeshire, is due to be carried out today.

Officers were called at about 3pm on Monday afternoon after a worker at the quarry in Block Fen Drove made the discovery.

Detective Inspector Jerry Waite, from the Beds, Cambs and Herts Major Crime Unit (MCU), said: “We are conducting enquiries both locally and across the county borders, and would urge anyone with information about the finding to contact us.

“Officers have been carrying out searches at a construction site in Mill Road, Sharnbrook in Bedfordshire, as we believe this is where the remains may have come from.”

A Cambridgeshire police spokesman said the sex of the victim will be one of the things to be established in a post mortem due to take place later on Wednesday.

Asked if detectives are connecting the discovery at a quarry in Mepal, near Ely, with two women who have been reported missing in the region, the spokesman said “that is not a link we are making at the minute”.

Investigators say they believe the remains came from a construction site nearly 40 miles away in Sharnbrook, Bedfordshire.

Police are trying to establish how long the head had been there.

An unnamed quarry worker told Bedfordshire on Sunday that his colleague discovered the remains after taking the cover off a skip he had transported back to Mepal.

The worker said: “His first thought was that it was a mannequin’s head.

“But then he realised it had eyebrows and hair, and suddenly clicked that it was actually a woman’s head.

“He said it had blood all over and was covered in dirt, but didn’t look like it had disintegrated.”

The worker added that his colleague described the features of the head as looking female, “and said she looked in her thirties or forties, but he couldn’t be 100%”.

The Mepal site where the head was found is used for landfill and recycling, as well as the supply of aggregates such as limestone and gravel, and mixing concrete.

•Anyone with information is asked to call the Major Crime Unit on 101 or Crimestoppers, anonymously, on 0800 555 111.