A First Nation on the western shore of Lake Manitoba remains in shock following a gruesome homicide discovered on Saturday.

Cindy Rubio says police have told her that it's her daughter's body that was discovered in the Sandy Bay First Nation, about 190 kilometres northwest of Winnipeg, and that it was found decapitated.

Police told the family the remains of Roberta McIvor, 32, had been found on opposite sides of a road, Rubio told The Canadian Press in a phone interview on Sunday.

RCMP have said publicly only that they are investigating the death of a female and that they consider it a homicide. An autopsy was scheduled for later Sunday.

Rubio said she last spoke to her daughter on Friday night, and that she was planning to spend the evening with family and friends.

McIvor leaves behind a 14-year-old daughter.

The close-knit family said the news, and the gruesome circumstances, have been hard to accept.

"We all got along very well. We all loved her so much," said Tracy Levasseur, McIvor's former mother-in-law.

McIvor's cousin, Kayla McIvor, 24, said they spoke to each other every day. She said her cousin was fun, outgoing and liked by everyone.

On Saturday, residents watched as investigators with the Dakota Ojibway Tribal Council and RCMP officers with the major crimes and forensic identification units began to comb the area for clues.

Alvin Levasseur, who lives in Sandy Bay, said he went out to take a look on Saturday after hearing about the gruesome discovery.

"I got up, went to check it out," he said. "There was a police line all around, about half a mile from each other."

Laura Mousseau said the investigators were hard at work on Saturday.

"When I went up there, the forensic team, I guess — guys in white, anyways — were taking pictures in the ditch," Laura Mousseau told CBC News.

"They were all around there, then they went a little bit north in the bush around my house. They were taking pictures around there, too."

A large area of the reserve was cordoned off as the investigation continued.

With files from The Canadian Press