[Mister.Hill]

Hi Jeremy,

Thanks so much for your feedback. It just so happens my son has purchased a handheld Dremel yesterday for an unrelated project, but he's now got all the bits to give this a try.

I'll flick a few his way to have a play with and see what happens.

Thanks once again.

[Wes Rankin]

Dear Evin,
Do you have a photo of this pearl? It would help if your photos show all sides of the pearl. A pearl of this size would be more for a collector than for jewelry use, so the value depends on the quality of the pearl.
Wes
www.allnaturalpearls.com

[xeresana]

Can abalone pearls be cultured? Has anyone figured out a way to do that? Just curious.

[nlerner]

Look at Eyris Blue Pearls: - http://www.bluepearls.com/
They use Abalone.

nora

[Ashley]

Hi There!

Abalone pearls are extemely difficult to culture. The Abalone animal, Haliotis (there are 7 identified species in North America, and a few different species in Europe, Asia, Australia and New Zealand) unfortunately are hemophiliacs- meaning that they will bleed to death if cut. Normal nucleation techniques just do not work with the Abalone.

In the early 1980's Dr. Fankboner from Pacific Pearl Culture, British Columbia, successfully experimented with culturing the Abalone Blister pearls (earlier attempts were made in the late 1800's with lackluster results), and it is also true that Eyris Pearl Co. of New Zealand has made some wonderful advances in culturing Abalone Mabe or blister pearls. Their pearls are extraordinarily colored deep blue and green tones and are very suitable for jewelry.

It is necessary to drill a hold through the surface of the animal's shell and then place the nuclei on the interior, and then seal the shell in order to stimulate pearl sac formation. Happily, pearl growth is a speedy process, and the pearls can actually attain large, lovely sizes of anywhere between 20-80 cts!

[Kevin Canning]

I've spoken with Dr. Fankboner who is no retired and he has leased his process to several groups attempting to cultured these pearls. It seems as though Kiwis are the only ones to have any large amount of success so far.

[Virginia Hatfield]

I have two Abalone Pearls that I am thinking about selling. Can anyone tell me what they may be worth. One is 24.5 cts or 4.9 gms 31.07mm x 20.21mm x 13mm. The other one is 13.5 cts or 2.7 gms 27.85mm x 11.85mm x 7.4mm. I have pics.
Thanks

[Caitlin]

Hi Virginia
I just love abalone pearls! When I was pricing them at the gem show they ran from $15 a gram for the worst ones and went up from there. Yours look pretty good, so I imagine they would be double or triple that rate, though I am not really sure.

Jeremy Norris is a member here who has expertise in Abalone pearls- amd buys them too.

Then there is Wes Rankin of Pacific Coast Pearls who is another expert. They have both posted here and you can probably PM and/or email them both.

[smetzler]

The pearls look very good, especially the larger one!

Great prices at the gem show. Looking at typical retail availability of loose abalones of gem quality we are seeing $100 per carat ($500/gram) at Pearl Paradise—sourced by Jeremy Norris—for H. fulgens, and $150 to $250 per carat ($750-$1250/gram) for H. Iris (Paua) from original source in NZ.

It would be well to get a handle on this before getting in any deeper! Perhaps mabe at the gem show?

Steve
Seattle

[smetzler]

Virginia,

Thanks for posting the new photos. The flat side of the rectangular ab is brilliant. Also the larger ab, in the second photo, seems to display a quality that I have not seen frequently in abalone pearls, commonly known as water (translucent outer layers of nacre). Very pretty.

It would be interesting to know how you came across these.

Did you reach the abalone pearl experts suggested by Caitlin for pricing estimates? $3 per carat at the gem show vs. $500 to $1250 at retail allows plenty of room for imagination.

Steve
Seattle

[Virginia Hatfield]

Thank you Steve and Caitlin. Am still trying to reach the experts as you suggested. I got the pearls from my father who got them from either Mexico or the coast of N.California near where I live. He showed and told me about them some years ago and I remember some things and not others. I do know he said the two were from within the animal and not the shell. I have two others that are Mabe or blisters from him and am also interested in selling them eventhough I know they are not worth as much. I have photos of them too. Does anyone know of any potential buyers for my pearls?
I just can't capture the true beauty and colors of any of these pearls with my camera. The smaller of the first two has alot more blue-greens in it than shown.
I have found this site to be very,very helpful with tons of information on quality pearls You are all great!.
Thank you so much,
Virginia
California

[Dave]

Hello everyone, my name is Dave and I found this site while searching for information on abalone pearls.

My Buddy comes from a family of long time fishermen in southern California. His family also owned a wholesale and retail fish market for a very long time. He has a collection of a dozen or so abalone pearls and was interested in selling a few if the price was right.

He showed me a few of them a couple days ago and it led me to my search for information on the subject.

I have read most of the topics here on the subject and recognize some names and businesses that also came up during my search so I thought I would start here.

This must be the lowest quality piece he has, because he gave it to me
But I thought I could use it as a test, since I am neither abalone pearl expert nor a photographer.

He calls this one "The Fish" because the design on one side resembles a fish. (At least to him and I).

Click on thumbnails for larger image:




Sadly, I lost most of the brilliance and colors in the pictures but I was mainly interested in seeing how they would show up in this post.
I should have used a quarter, it's closer to the actual size than a dime.

Eyeballing it against a ruler I would say this one is 27mm long 15mm wide and 7mm at it's thickest. (weight unknown but feels solid)

I have seen it mentioned several times that the value of these pearls run from $15 a gram, upward. I have also seen a few posts where contact has been made with someone in the business through private message or email.

Would it be worth my time and trouble to try to photograph these pearls?
Some of them have been looked at by jewelers and a gemologist and told my friend they were worth a considerable amout of money. Would anybody here be able to give some sort of "ballpark figure", or be a serious collector of abalone pearls?

Thank you for taking the time to read my post.
Dave

[Dave]

I hope this isn't against the rules or anything but I thought perhaps somone might enjoy these pictures of abalone shells.

(Plus the fact that I found a ruler and still trying to figure out this camera)


He gave me that a couple years ago and I thought it was the most beautiful abalone shell I had seen. (until yesterday).

One of the pearls he has is very small but it is a brilliant white "pearly" color that really sparkles.
I was amazed by it and he told me it was from a "Sorenson" Abalone.
I never heard of a white abalone before, even growing up in Southern California and being a sport fisherman myself.

He ran off and a few minutes later brought me this Sorenson shell, this one has a flaw in it and a bunch or worm holes, but looks absolutly brillant in person.


Hope you enjoyed those as much as me,
Dave

[Caitlin]

Hi Dave
Thanks for the photos. If you want to sell to anyone except in person, photos and weigths in grams are very helpful. If you read all our posts on the subject, you know as much as we do. However you are welcome to post more photos.

Since your pearls are not as huge as the last one, they may be more saleable to the folks previously mentioned. I imagine photo, dimensions, and weights on each one would be helpful to them too. Maybe one photo with them all and the combined weight. It would be great for the record to have them here too. We see very few of these pearls.

If they aren't dried out and chalky $15 per gram is a good starting price, especially if you sell to a wholesaler, but they could be worth far more. It is not an easy market, though.

[Dave]

Thank you Caitlin for you advice and taking the time to reply.

I think I found a source for a good scale, a friend has a gold shop and makes jewelery but he's been sick recenty. I'm sure he could weigh them and I'll edit these posts at that time.

I told my friend that most of the abalone pearls I seen online are cone shaped, and none of the ones he showed me so far were. He said he prefered the egg shaped ones and brought me a cone shaped pearl and an irregular shaped one to play around with.

I don't feel comfortable having his prized pearls in my possession but if I can get the pictures to start turning out better he'll bring them down and I'll get the pictures. I don't want to try till I get a little more practice.

Here is one I'll call The Cone

(Click on the thumbnails for a larger image)







Sadly, the pictures loose most of the colors and brillance

Size (approx)
Length= 49mm
Width= 19mm
Thickness= 10mm
Weight= Unknown (will edit as soon as possible.

Regards,
Dave