[NaturalPearls]

Valeria101:About the age of the pearl, I have no clue. will have to get back to my father for that! I think its hard to know the age of it, cultured pearls are grown by humin beings, which makes it easier to calculate the pearls age. However, I am still going to ask the expert!.

GemGeek: will post some more tomorrow, its 1130 pm here. What do u want to see? brooches, earrings, or necklaces?

[GemGeek]

YES!!! (all of the above)

[Valeria101]

Originally Posted by NaturalPearls

What do u want to see?

That's easy - pearls!

If you happen to have a handful of different sizes shapes and colors sitting somewhere unset all for the better. I have only a vague idea of what exactly comes out of the water: even jewelers who do have a couple of pieces with natural pearls (and that's allot to ask!) can hardly show what the range of pearl choices is! And you guys can...

[knotty panda]

Originally Posted by GemGeek

Paspaley had equipment that they put on their flat-bed boats to x-ray the shells to see if the implants were still inside and how much growth had occured. The oysters were in nets that were passed across a table through the machine.

They also had cleaning machines where the nets were passed through a high-pressure water spray, above and below, to blast off the build-up of foreign matter on the shells.

Cool, huh?

Maybe, maybe not, right Josh? Depends on what they did with the "build-up of foreign matter." There are more eco-friendly methods of build-up removal.

[quote=Caitlin Williams]Then if the cultured pearl techies were to remove the pearl, it could even have a tissue nucleus put in and gently replaced back into the gulf. [quote]

I was under the impression saltwater and tissue nucleation wasn't possible at this point. Although I don't know the reason why.

[GemGeek]

Originally Posted by knotty panda

Maybe, maybe not, right Josh? Depends on what they did with the "build-up of foreign matter." There are more eco-friendly methods of build-up removal..

On Marutea, I saw people scrub oysters by hand, using water and rinsing it overboard -- basically the same as Paspaley, just not automated. That leads me to doubt that scrubbing off the opportunistic overgrowth hurts the environment. It came from the environment, so returning it shouldn't have much effect. What could be more eco-friendly than washing something that came from the water, with water, on the water? Of course, I could be wrong (and I'm no stranger to being wrong). What do you think would be more eco-friendly?

[knotty panda]

I seem to remember Josh saying something about high pressure washers being bad for the environment. The bad stuff isn't contained and presents more problems. There's some microbe that eats the bad stuff and ecologically recycles it which is much better for the environment.

[smetzler]

Originally Posted by Valeria101

Any chance natural pearls could be produced by rearing shells but not tempering with the pearls (no nuceation, tissue or otherwise)? Some other wild, weird way to rekindle supply of naturals?

Jeremy S, during my visit to Pearl Paradise we discussed parasite induction as a means of recuperating the poe pipi collection on Penryhn (Cook Islands), such a practice maintaining natural status. Did I understand correctly that your view is this would be allowed?

NaturalPearls: I have no doubt that you have inventory. Would love to see more pictures, and anecdotes, in support of recent collection. Meanwhile, you can be sure I have interest in a 13mm satin white drop to replace a cultured SS centerpiece in an otherwise natural pearl necklace that was made for us last year…

[GemGeek]

Originally Posted by knotty panda

I seem to remember Josh saying something about high pressure washers being bad for the environment. The bad stuff isn't contained and presents more problems. There's some microbe that eats the bad stuff and ecologically recycles it which is much better for the environment.

I'm curious about the specifics of that. Do you mean that making finer particles out of the stuff coating the shell, spreads it farther, causing more growth, not less? Hmmm... very interesting!

[knotty panda]

Kamoka pearls website; "Philosophy", pg. 3:

"ECOLOGICAL RESPONSIBILTY
However, a myriad of other organisms take advantage of these suspended ropes near the surface and latch onto the oysters, harming their growth and severely affecting pearl quality. Typically, this obstacle is dealt with by periodically removing the oysters from the water and blasting them clean with high-pressure hoses. This practice results in numerous environmental problems. For example, the blasting breaks up caustic anemones, causing a population explosion that the environment cannot assimilate. Many atolls in French Polynesia have suffered because of this."

Josh, do I go to the head of Kamoka class? Is this what you're talking about, Blaire?

Pg. 4 describes Josh's effort to ban high pressure washing and his environmental successes. Think globally, act locally.

The hunks on pages 5 and 6 are eye candy!

[Valeria101]

Originally Posted by smetzler

Jeremy S, during my visit to Pearl Paradise we discussed parasite induction as a means of recuperating the poe pipi collection on Penryhn (Cook Islands), such a practice maintaining natural status. Did I understand correctly that your view is this would be allowed?

Wouldn't know who could/should allow any such intervention to begin with.

On the other hand, it seems fair to acknowledge that various natural factors induce pearl production throughout localized mussel populations, making pearl occurrence more predictable then lore would have it (where 'lore' refers to pseudo-statistics touting either the impossibility of obtaining natural pearls, or the stratospheric rarity of one that is offered, or both). It would be a change even just to monitor such occurrences and get a better idea if pearling is sustainable or not under foreseeable economic circumstances.

While you might have noticed from my posts here that I am not the greenest gremlin on Earth, ecological interventions are not one of the things that make me sleep well at night... I was more conservative, imagining that all that would change would be the amount of information 'extracted' about pearl grounds, with nothing added in that shouldn't have been there in the first place. Things should add up: natural pearls are quite the luxury item, environmental monitoring costs make those concerns and projects a high end enterprise with convenient public profile... you could even get funding for such pet project these days!

[GemGeek]

Originally Posted by knotty panda

Kamoka pearls website; "Philosophy", pg. 3:

"ECOLOGICAL RESPONSIBILTY
However, a myriad of other organisms take advantage of these suspended ropes near the surface and latch onto the oysters, harming their growth and severely affecting pearl quality. Typically, this obstacle is dealt with by periodically removing the oysters from the water and blasting them clean with high-pressure hoses. This practice results in numerous environmental problems. For example, the blasting breaks up caustic anemones, causing a population explosion that the environment cannot assimilate. Many atolls in French Polynesia have suffered because of this."

Josh, do I go to the head of Kamoka class? Is this what you're talking about, Blaire?

Pg. 4 describes Josh's effort to ban high pressure washing and his environmental successes. Think globally, act locally.

The hunks on pages 5 and 6 are eye candy!

I understood that they have to be washed. Does Josh not wash them? Or is it done by hand on the water like Wan?

[knotty panda]

We need Mr. Josh to zoom in here. I think I'll red flag him.

[Josh]

Sorry, sorry, sorry. Late to class again.
The best way we have found for cleaning our oysters is to put them in special zones where the fish gently pick off all the fouling. What's neat is that there is a fish species that corresponds to every type of fouling, be it anemones, pipis (Pinctada Maculatas I think), algaes, crustaceans, sea mats, etc, etc. Even neater still is that all this has a positive impact on the fish populations and works to counter the overfishing that happens anywhere humans live.
A few months back we had a routine visit from the work inspection board. The guy was all excited because he remembered our farm by the clouds of fish he had seen ten years earlier.
Blaire, to get back to your question: the problem with tossing fouling back in the water is that with some species (like anenomes) it's like throwing seeds into the wind. They can grow a whole new anemone from a single tentacle so you can only imagine what chopping millions into millions of pieces will do in a mostly closed lagoon. I wrote a petition and HALF the population of the island signed it, banning water pressure hoses forever from our atoll. People still use them on land over collection trenches, but no longer over the water.

[GemGeek]

Josh, that is a very good explanation. It's wonderful that you found a way to solve the problem, while helping out the local fish population at the same time. When we were on Marutea, they pointed out some fish that they use to clean the oysters when they come in for nucleation.

I'm jealous that you're going to the Sea of Cortez. I wonder if they have waves down there....

[Caitlin]

I was under the impression saltwater and tissue nucleation wasn't possible at this point. Although I don't know the reason why.

The way natural all pearls form is for epithelial cells from the mantle tissue to enter the mantle of the scallop/mussel and thus form a pearl sack. No big beads in gonads, here. 19th century scientists showed that the formation of the pearl sack is key- the reason for the epithelial cells being carried into the mantle can vary.

As Strack says, "It is essential that the epithelium cells of the upper epithelium are transferred into the connective tissue, where they proceed to form a closed cyst, which is called the pearl sack." (p115)