Pearls in clams?

[Gloria]

I was eating little neck clams that my husband and I steamed ourselfes
and found a pearl inside one of them.
The shell it cam out of had a deformation in it.We never heard of a
pearl coming from a clam. Can you tell us anything about this and is the
pearl worth anything?
Gloria

[Kevin Canning]

This does happen on occassion but is an extremely rare occurence. Pearls are found in oysters and mussels, but I have only heard of a few instances of a pearl being discovered in a clam. Theoretically any bivalve can produce a pearl, and this does include clams.

The value, however, I am not sure of. This is not a type of pearl we sell. If the quality of the pearl was very high, I imagine as a natural pearl it would have some value. I would suggest sending it to a gem-lab, like "Northwest Gem Laboratory" in Boise Idaho. Sharon Wakefield is the gemologist at this lab and is quite a pearl expert. I am sure she would be able to give you more information as this is her specialty.

Hope this has helped you out!

[jshepherd]

Although rare, pearls are found in clams. But as these 'pearls' contain no nacre the value is typically quite low.

These pearls can grow very large. The largest I have heard of is 'The Pearl of Allah', which is an astounding 9.5-inches in length.

I would agree with POJ regarding the value of this find. If the pearl appears to be of high quality send it to a lab that specializes in pearls to determine value.