Tahitian Black Pearls
Know your Pearls, Girls! Tahitian Black pearls are Bead-Nucleated. What this means, in an oyster-shell, is that however handsmome these dark Tahitians appear to be, they are not a true Natural Pearl. A black pearl, of natural color, is produced by the Pinctada Margaritifera, (the source of Natural and Cultured Black Pearls) Pinctada Mazatlanica or Pteria Sterna pearl oyster. The color of a natural black pearl is not caused by subsequent processing. Tahitian pearls belong to the Cultured Pearl family and are a species of the South Seas Pearls. The amazing range of colors of Tahitian pearls can hit you all at once, in a single pearl, observed from the centre of the pearl outward. Only a Tahitian black pearl can give you a pink and green mixed in unlikely combinations without producing brown. Tahiti is the commercial center and trading hub for the Tahitian pearl industry, but surprisingly there are actually, no pearl farms located on the island of Tahiti itself.
The pearl farms are scattered around Tahiti and throughout French Polynesia, as far east as the Gambier Islands, and beyond French Polynesia to the west into the Micronesian Islands. Australia, the Seychelles and Vietnam have all produced black pearls, but those pearls are not true Tahitian pearls. The oyster that produces this type of pearls itself is large - sometimes over 12 inches across and weighing as much as 10 pounds, which often results in much larger than average pearls. Tahitian Pearls are unique because of their dark color. However, most "black" Tahitian pearls are not actually black, but are instead silver, charcoal, or a multitude of colors with the dominant color being green. Truly black pearls are very rare and among the most beautiful pearls in the world. Not only are these black pearls beautiful, but the black-lipped oyster's mother-of-pearl inner shell, is also very beautiful. By the early part of the 20th century, before conservation and re-population efforts had started, this mother-of-pearl oyster had almost been hunted to extinction for its shell alone. When Did Tahitian Pearl Farming Start?Tahitian pearl farming has much later commercial origins than Mikimoto cultured pearls. In the early 1960's, a man by the name of Jean-Marie Domard began experimenting with the ‘Pinctada margaritifera’ using Japanese culturing techniques. In 1962, Mr. Domard successfully nucleated 5,000 oysters, and after 3 years harvested more than 1000 high-quality Tahitian pearls.Reference: Jeremy Shepherd of PearlParadise.com Josh Humbert of KamokaPearls.com Photo courtesy kamokapearls.com
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