Amazing carrot find for lost ring's owner

Carol Creighton was stunned when her friend found an eternity ring embedded in a carrot in her vegetable garden, more than 10 years after she had lost it. Photo/: Samuel White

Balclutha woman Carol Creighton had given up on ever finding her lost eternity ring - until a friend dug up her vegetable garden.

''He said to me, 'I think I've got a surprise for you','' Mrs Creighton (76) said of her friend, Tom Dickson (82), when he handed her a bunch of carrots from her vegetable garden yesterday.

''He said, 'What have you lost?'''

She saw he had a bit of dirt in his hands and the only thing she could think of was the eternity ring given to her by her mother.

Then Mr Dickson, who knew she had misplaced the ring years ago, produced the carrot with the eternity ring around it.

Mrs Creighton said she last recalled having the ring in 2006.

''I was out in the garden and, as girls do, very proud of wearing their rings and what have you, and I lost it.''

She searched for it at the time, but to no avail.

As the years went by, she gave up any hope of ever seeing it again.

Mrs Creighton was so excited and overwhelmed that she pulled the green top off the carrot in surprise.

She had been out in her garden every year digging up vegetables, laying compost and planting seedlings and never found the ring, she said.

''I just could not believe it. I was absolutely stunned.''

Earlier this month, Canadian woman Mary Grams also found her engagement ring wrapped in a carrot, having lost it at her family farm in 2004.