Torres Pearls at Escape River, Far North Queensland, Australia

[R&B]

Hi all

We are quite new to the Pearl Guide, but have been reading the different forums and threads for a while now and decided it was time to get involved. My husband, Rusty, posted some comments in the Maeshori thread recently.

Our pearl farm is located on Turtlehead Island in Escape River, just 20km below the tip of Queensland in Australia on the east coast. The island is placed at the junction of Escape and Middle Rivers, where they flow into the Coral Sea, making it a very nutrient-rich system, perfect for growing South Sea pearls.

We have owned the farm for only two and a half years, and have just had our first harvest. We are really pleased with the results - a very high percentage of round pearls, and a high proportion of pink-tinged pearls in an experimental batch that were strategically placed in the river.

Please check out the link below to our webpage, and take a look at our farm blog for news and photos of our farm.

http://www.torrespearls.com

Rusty & Bronwyn Tully
Torres Pearls Pty Ltd
Turtlehead Island
Escape River
Far North Queensland
Australia

[Caitlin]

Dang! It is so great to have you posting. Your honkin' baroque strand is to die for! I need to take more time and look around after I am done with some other things, but I wish you two the very best. I would LOVE to see your farm. It sounds so romantic in its location and resources. I bet its hard work, but lucky you!!!

[Lagoon Island Pearls]

We have owned the farm for only two and a half years, and have just had our first harvest.

You've done well in a short space of time. Surely you must have experience at other farms?

a high proportion of pink-tinged pearls in an experimental batch that were strategically placed in the river.

Interesting. Am I correct in assuming this is within the intertidal estuary? Do you think the pink-tinge is a result of Ph or suspended minerals from the upland?

I ask because I'm from Canada, where it rains a lot. For me, freshwater lenses tend to be a detriment, but then again it's not river water.

You are very fortunate to be able to utilize a river, because aquaculturists here are required to keep a great distance from fish bearing streams.

Again, welcome to the discussion group and best wishes for your continued success.

[R&B]

Thank you Caitlin and Dave
It kinda is hard work Caitlin but I think Dave would vouch for this as I've been looking at his re-establishment through the forum. Due to the location, remoteness and the serenity it ceases to be hard work and more of a labour of love. Perhaps a necessity of the idealic existence. We are totally exempt from the modern world's day to day drudgery (other than death and taxes) and an 8 hour day is something we chuckle about.
Our shell are actually an extention of our family as in it's our responsability to nurture them or they will not survive. As we grow over the next five years we have vowed never to grow to the size that one of us are unable to be on the cleaning boat. It is very difficult to find employee's with the same attitude toward the shell and equipment as us.
Dave I had no experience as in working on Pearl Farms before purchasing this one. I did regularly fly in buying pearls and through observation, worked out what not to do.
The previous owners were pretty ruthless take-over merchants that had taken over the previous company and then virtually stripped the asset as best they could. I simply was in the right place at the right time as they wanted to dump it and move on. (Watch out share holders of the world there are bad people lurking around wanting your assests).
I did not finish school Dave so I can't help you with scientific data. I'm a practical hands on trial by error kind of operator. I do know from the Japanesse that had this farm in the sixties and seventies about positioning the shell. Ph has bearing but to what degree time will tell. Our lease has been extended further up the river which is quite exciting and we should be able to extend our tials further up river after the comming wet season. A serious bonus for us is the fact that if you observe just about every other farm in australia, they are virtually in the ocean. Have a look at us on google earth and you will see we are actually in the junction of two rivers and extend up both.
We are the biggest farm in Queensland by area. People think this is our advantage, but it's purely the position of the farm within the mangrove estuary.
Caitlin, we are very open to visitors from the pearl-guide. We are very excited about being able to converse through the forum however there's nothin beats live face to face chat.
I'm very interested in your operation Dave and have no knowledge of a bivalve industry in Canada. No doubt you are also busy but I'd love to know what you expect to acheive. I'd better get off my butt and head out and soak up some serenity.
See you folks, Rusty.

[Nerida]

Nice to have you on pearl-guide!

Great to hear about some independent operations going on - doesn't seem to be too many of you! Your farm looks idyllic, and maybe just maybe I will get there some day. Thank you so much for sharing with us!

[Bernadette]

Welcome to you both to Pearl-Guide.

I reckon with your hands on approach and love of pearls, you will bring out the very best in them-thanks for sharing.

[GemGeek]

Thanks for posting the website and welcome to the forum. We can't get enough of authentic pearl info, and especially, photos!

[pattye]

Spent a bit of time on your website, lovely photos, interesting blog also. Great pic of Bronwyn in gorgeous pearls, and look forward to more pearl pics, of course, the pink ones, too! Thank you, Rusty, for giving us the farm's history and your insights.

[Lagoon Island Pearls]

Due to the location, remoteness and the serenity it ceases to be hard work and more of a labour of love. Perhaps a necessity of the idealic existence. We are totally exempt from the modern world's day to day drudgery (other than death and taxes) and an 8 hour day is something we chuckle about.

We share the same viewpoint on many fronts. Lagoon Island is only a short boat ride from Tofino, near to impossible to access from the south because of extensive tidal flats, but only at high tide. Even then it's not practical, because it's easy to become marooned for several hours and possibly days, depending on the moon phase. Access to the farm is via going arount the top of the island then south, which has a ithsmus at the entrance of the lagoon. Technically, it's part of Meares Island and only becomes an island unto itself a few times a year. The entrance to the north has uncharted rock "fangs" in the middle which scare away even the more experienced boaters. An ideal situation from a security and serenity standpoint. It's rugged, rustic and not for the faint of heart.

Dave I had no experience as in working on Pearl Farms before purchasing this one. I did not finish school Dave so I can't help you with scientific data. I'm a practical hands on trial by error kind of operator.

To go from no experience to a producer of gorgeous SS gems in two and a half years is a feat, Rusty! I'm no scientist either, but endeavour to be technically correct, while often admitting to being naively misleading. Observation and ecology are words often used here.

I'm very interested in your operation Dave and have no knowledge of a bivalve industry in Canada. No doubt you are also busy but I'd love to know what you expect to acheive.

Never to busy to discuss pearls!!

This area is part of a United Nations Biosphere, where sustainable development is the keystone for industry. For many years, beautiful Clayoquot Sound was the epicenter of environmental activism, preventing clear-cut logging over-fishing and mining. The farm is surrounded by ancient rainforest. The reaches to the farm (Lemmens Inlet) boast more species per square unit than any other ocean in the world, second only to the Red Sea. Food is plentiful and growth is seasonally rapid. Eighteen to twenty months is my target cycle.

I vowed to myself years ago, to never tear a page out of the southern oceans book in developing my farm, even though some techniques are utilized. Monoculture is one of them. Diversity is important to me. I enjoy the priviledge of harvesting optimal adult shell stock for conditioning and grafting, without the precarous burden of hatcheries, inbreeding or juvenile rearing. The bulk of my work involves Mytilus californianus aka the California mussel, but leave no stone unturned in my research, dabbling with gastropods, cephalopods, pectens and even some species of venus clams. No abalone though. It's been tried before in Canada and failed miserably on many counts.

I've harvested a lot of natural pearls from mussels ranging from the whitest whites to the blackest blacks as well as some magnificent colors in between. I am very fortunate to be involved with collaberative studies in the causes and formation of natural pearls, with some of the most preeminent scientists and experts in the field.

Although I have some inventory hanging from floats, the main goal of my operation is a "free range" concept, where animals are grafted and reintroduced to their place of birth in the middle intertidal zone. This all but eliminates anti-fouling needs, as the daily turn of the tides, exposure to air, sun and critters keep the animals clean naturally. It also allows me to inspect their growth and survival regularly. Just recently, I've been granted an experimental lease in the very stomping ground of my mentor Ed Ricketts at Clayoquot Island.

Like yourself, I don't expect to produce much more than a few kilograms of pearls annually, but focus upon unique features in the finished product. I currently have inventories of beaded, non-beaded and mabe shell stock in growout.

Perhaps one day, I would be fortunate enough to attend your farm. Be welcomed here anytime. We often kick around the idea of a mini-ruckus here in Canada, because many of the contributors of this forum are on the west coast of the continent.

So once again, thank you for sharing your experiences with us and I look forward to future discussions.

[Caitlin]

Hi R&B

Did you ever give us a Google Earth address to see your place? I read your history time line! Impressed!

Escape river sounds like fresh water. Are your pearl-growing waters brackish? How brackish can pearl-growing water be and still have healthy mollusks?

[Adeline Leigh]

Tee hee, I can see the cogs and wheels in your mind a-going, Caitlin. Happy sleuthing!

[Caitlin]

Nothing like going to the source~

[Bodecia]

Welcome Rusty and Bronwyn,

Great to have you join us all. I live in South Australia so quite a distance from you but it is one place I would love to visit some time. It does sound like heaven and sounds like you won the lottery, timing wise. Good luck with your pearling ventures. Wish I was there.

Caitlin, I Goggled the site too and it looks to me as if is totally saltwater. The Rivers appear to be estuaries with beautiful clear seas just the other side of Turtlehead Island. No brackish water.

What a wonderful place to live and work. True life style. Might get a hot and tad humid up there though When Rusty and Bronwyn say it was cold at 22 deg Centrigrade they probably meant it. Once you are used to the heat 22 deg C can feel cold

Dawn - Bodecia
http://stores.ebay.com/Dawns-Designer-Collections
Natural pearl collector and all round pearl lover

[CortezPearls]

Great to see more farmers into the Forum! Welcome
Hope we can use your expertise in many future posts to further the educational aspect of the forum.

How many oysters do you grow in your farm?

[R&B]

Hello all
Sorry for not responding earlier but I'm just getting used to how this page works.
Caitlin the waters are not brakish. If you go on googleearth an type in "Turtlehead Island, Queensland", you will see that both escape river and middle river come together in a large bay on the inside of the island.
I think the bay area is the secret to our success, this large secondary volume of sea water quickly dilutes the mangrove river waters way before the normal routine of a river simply running into the ocean.
It is on the edge of the bay and slightly up the river we are finding most favourable.
That's all I'll say on that at this stage of experimentation.
Dawn, south australia is only as far as you wish it to be. Adeline, thanks for your comment on Bron's blog on our web page. It's there for people caught up in the ho-hum of the "real world".
Caitlin, your questions and thoughts are most welcome.
Cortez Pearls, pleased to meet you, we are focusing on three to five thousand. We are not there yet but building slowly as it's all a learning curve that's realy enjoyable and we don't want to be over burdened and reliant on staff.
Within reason Bronwyn and I welcome Pearl Guiders interested in visiting us in our idyllic existence.
You will probably read a bit more from me now as I think I've worked this page response thing out. It's back to work for me, see you.