How long does it take to form one pearl?
Since ancient times, it was believed that natural pearls appear when oysters rise to the surface of the water at dawn and open their shells to collect dew droplets. And the collected droplets subsequently turn into pearls. A beautiful and interesting misconception. In addition to the legend, we will tell you 14 Most Amazing Facts About Pearls, which you may not have even thought about: 1. Pearls are the only gemstone that is extracted from living animals. 
2. All pearl oysters are born male and change to female at about three years of age. 
3. La Peregrina is one of the most famous pearls in the world and means “incomparable” in Spanish. The 500-year-old unique pearl is pear-shaped and reaches the size of a large pigeon egg. Its owners were Philip II, King of Spain, Mary Tudor, Napoleon Bonaparte and Elizabeth Taylor. 
4. All mollusks are capable of creating pearls. Saltwater pearls are collected from oysters, and freshwater pearls are collected from mussels. 
5. Pearls have been considered precious since ancient times, as evidenced by an artifact from Mesopotamia dating back to approximately 2300 BC. 
6. Each pearl is unique and has its own flaws. You will not find two identical pearls. 
7. Pearl growth can take from several months to several years, and its development is influenced by water conditions, size and type of mollusk. It takes approximately 5 years to form an average-sized pearl. 
8. 95% of pearls today are grown on pearl farms. When harvesting pearls, the mollusk stays alive and produces more pearls because small balls are re-implanted into it, which then turn into pearls. 
9. The color of the pearl depends on the internal elements of the shell of the mollusk and can vary from white and ivory to pink, black, purple and even gold. And only one out of 13 thousand pearls is pink. 
10. Only 5% of all pearls are grown in salt water. Akoya, Tahitian and South Sea pearls are the three main types of saltwater cultured pearls. Typically, ocean oysters are grown with only one pearl at a time. 
11. Freshwater pearls make up approximately 95% of the world’s total pearl production. One mussel can produce 30 to 50 pearls at a time. 
12. There are eight shapes of pearls – round, semicircular, button, drop, oval, hoop, baroque and semi-baroque. 
13. Pearl was the most popular middle name out of 320 given to baby girls in England and Wales in 2012. 
14. In 1916, Louis Cartier, one of the world’s famous jewelers, bought a New York mansion on 5th Avenue for two natural pearl necklaces worth $1,2 million. 
So, dear Ladies, you can now surprise your interlocutors not only with the beauty of pearls, but also with the most interesting facts! 
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Natural pearls
Natural pearls
About pearls
Until the 1th century, when their price gave way to diamonds, natural pearls were valued above all other gemstones throughout history. While their beauty and the fact that they came from shellfish ready to eat were important factors, it was the sheer rarity that raised their value to the highest level. The formation of a large, beautiful and perfect natural pearl is an event so unlikely in nature that only those at the pinnacle of wealth and power in society could own them. Depending on the species, between 1000/1 and 500000/XNUMX clams will form pearls during their lifetime, and the vast majority will be small, faded, or defective.
Real pearls are called “nacre pearls” because of their composition. Such a pearl is formed when a small foreign object penetrates the soft body of a filter-feeding or grazing clam and cannot be expelled. Sometimes the irritant is a random piece of shell or bone, but most often it is a parasite. Layers of calcium carbonate crystals and protein are released to slowly cover all parts of the object, which then becomes a pearl. If it grows entirely inside the animal’s body, it will be a three-dimensional “pearl-cyst”, if it grows attached to a shell, it will be a “pearl-vesicle”.
We can perhaps imagine the awe and mystery that these objects evoked among the ancient peoples who found and cherished them, and it is not surprising that mythical and mystical explanations for their formation were numerous. Imagine the creature shown below being assembled (not all spotless and clean as shown) but covered in dirt and algae and its interior greyish, lumpy and slimy, matching the iridescent object in the adjacent photo.
The beauty of mother-of-pearl pearls lies in the combination of their shape, color and surface reflection (shine). In the best specimens, these features are enhanced by the iridescence of the surface, called “orient”. The shape of the pearl is largely determined by chance (the shape of the stimulus) and its anatomical position in the animal’s body. Body color will vary depending on the species of mollusk, which typically produces pearls that are the same shade as their shell lining. The shimmer and/or luster of the pearl will be a consequence of the perfection and thickness of the layers of nacre from which the bulbous pearl is made.
Nacre (NAY-ker) is composed of plate-like hexagonal crystals of translucent aragonite (a form of calcium carbonate), the prothiene conchiolin (konk-KY-oh-lin), and water. Each crystal is very thin, and they are stacked like bricks in a checkerboard pattern with a protein “motar” between them. The light reflected and scattered on the uneven surface and the thin inner layers create a wonderful effect of shine and orientation.
Pearls consist of both saltwater and freshwater bivalves (two shells: oysters and mussels) and solids (one shell: snails). What we call saltwater pearl “oysters” are not directly related to the edible varieties of oysters. Thus, a plate of oysters that you may enjoy for lunch should remain a mere gastronomic pleasure, since it will not contain a pearl. However, if you’re a fan of freshwater mussels or abalone, your chance of finding a pearl, however thin, exists if you eat it raw (cooking the pearls ruins it).
In the modern world, the word “pearl” means “cultured pearl” to almost everyone. It’s technically illegal to sell or advertise cultured pearls as pearls without using the adjective “cultured,” but no one really cares about enforcing it. These days, natural pearls are even rarer than in historical times due to overfishing and pollution. Their fans are not so much the richest among us, but rather those who, for philosophical, spiritual/religious or aesthetic reasons, seek out these rarities. This shift in the position of natural pearls from status symbol to quasi-cult objects resulted from the spectacular success of pearl culture. With its technical beginnings around 1890 and large-scale production by the early 1920s, pearl culture made this gemstone available to almost anyone, with varying qualities and prices.
Cultured Pearls: Sizes Up and Prices Down!
Looking at the photos above, we begin to understand why cultured pearls have gained worldwide popularity. Natural pearls tend to be small in size and vary in shape and color, cultured pearls, especially in today’s market, are uniform in size, shape and color and can be huge! In nature, it can take an oyster six or seven years to make a pearl 4mm in diameter, and only 1-2 out of a hundred of them will be round. In addition, the colors are not uniform.
In today’s market, natural pearls are available through small-scale (legal) collection and as vintage and antique specimens or jewelry.
Are they really natural?
If you are looking for antique jewelry with natural pearls, you should know that imitation pearls have a long history and have sometimes been used in surprisingly “high-end” jewelry. The “dental test” is usually useful (though not from a hygiene point of view). The surface of mother-of-pearl pearls (natural or cultured) will be slightly grainy. This microscopic roughness can be detected by gently rubbing the pearl along the edges of the front teeth. Imitation pearls (usually made from glass or shell) have a smooth surface and do not appear rough. Also, if the pearls in your antique piece are the same size, luster and color, your “fraud antennae” should be alert.
Non-pearl “pearls”
Technically, a shellfish product that is not made from mother-of-pearl is not a pearl, but a “calcareous stone.” Having said that, I note that they run the gamut from chalk marble-like products such as edible oysters, which have no gem value, to the most valuable and rare gemstones in the world. For the purpose of this essay, I will name these beautiful and valuable pearls.
Three worth noting are conch pearls (pronounced conk), scallop pearls, and melo-melo pearls. Each is composed of calcium carbonate, but primarily in the form of calcite rather than aragonite, and with different structural characteristics and protein proportions than their nacreous counterparts.
Conch pearls are the product of a large sea snail, the queen of shells. It is native to the Caribbean and, until it was fished to near extinction, was found in abundance in the waters of the Florida Keys. Pearl colors range from white to hot pink, and pearls are usually small in size (8mm) and ovoid in shape. You can see in the picture below and to the right the very desirable variability in “flame structure” found in the best examples. (Pearl lovers of the shell are not to blame for the depopulation of Florida, since they are largely just a rare byproduct of the hunt for this mollusk: the meat of the shell is a delicacy, its pink shell lining is used in jewelry, especially cameos, and the shell itself is a tourist attraction.)
Scallop
The newest type of natural pearl available to collectors is the scallop. It is found in the bivalve scallop, which is native to the coast of Baja California and is just beginning to be collected. They are very varied in size and shape, have a mosaic pattern, cream, salmon or lilac color with a semi-metallic or iridescent sheen.
Pearl Melo Melo
By far the hardest pearl on Earth to obtain is the Indo-Pacific sea snail pearl: round, smooth and sometimes quite large, I recently held a pearl the size of a large gumball in my hand and almost dropped it when I reported a price of $50. The colors and structure of the flame are the same as the conch pearl.
To date, no pearls without nacre have been successfully cultured, and each has a unique structure that makes it difficult to counterfeit, so there is no need to worry about synthetics and simulants.
