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Originally Posted by Slraep Hi Douglas,
That's really interesting about the yellowy colour due to pollution. I never thought it might be because the molluscs are sick. Do you think it is the mercury,PCBs or pesticides? These three things seem to be THE major water pollution players.
Can you imagine, on top of everyday survival(tough enough), battling nucleation mortality and being subjected to antibiotics and growth hormones, the poor oyster can't even get a steam of fresh water to filter. It hurts to think about it.
Slraep |
The initial news given to me by a researcher in Japan was that the close proximity of fish farms (mainly of "Fugu" or
Sphoeroides) was the main responsible for causing the yellow pearls...he explained that the use of a parasite remover (many fish will have "lice", specially if kept at high densities) was very toxic for shellfish. This substance was Formaldehyde (1%), which was basically just thrown into the fish cages (which are in the ocean). Not a very smart move...there are ways to do this without damaging the environment (but at a monetary cost, of course). I can imagine the Japanese have learned and are no longer using this barbaric method.
In order to really determine if toxic/heavy metals are found in the shell or pearls, we would have to perform a detailed analytical chemistry of shells and pearls. This would allow us to have clear, concise and precise results...no need to draw conjectures.
This goes into the realm of Gem Labs...they have the people, the resources and the tools. It would be interesting to test pearls from different eras: natural, cultured from the early Mikimoto era, then 1950's, 1960's and all the way to present date. It would be an interesting project.