I have always loved the look of freshwater pearls, but I never thought that I would be able to afford them. Buying fake pearls seems like a waste. They are so obviously phony. The plastic just does not compare to the luster of a real Pearl. That was before I found out about what are cultured pearls. I did not know that there were pearls available for purchase that looked just like natural ones, but for much less. It is amazing how much cheaper they are!
If you have never heard about what are cultured pearls, the concept is pretty simple. Basically, a pearl is the reaction that an oyster has to an irritant. When something which shouldn't be there get stuck inside an oysters body, it secretes a coating around it. This coating becomes the pearl. Now that I know what cultured pearls are, it is amazing to me that no one thought of them sooner. Basically, with a cultured pearl, a little speck of something is inserted by a technician inside of the oyster. It produces the pearl to protect itself from the irritant in the same way that it would in nature.
Finding out about what are cultured pearls, I discovered some amazing things about the industry. Apparently, cultured pearls are much cheaper than real ones because they are easier to produce. Although they look the same and cannot be distinguished except by an expert, it is much easier to retrieve cultured pearls than to retrieve real ones. You need to dive to the sea bottom to get a real pearl, but cultured pearls can be produced in a lab. Every pearl expert knows all about what are cultured pearls, and most of them are willing to pay a good chunk of extra money for pearls that came about naturally. I think this is ridiculous. They both look the same, after all, and both of them were made by an oyster.
Nonetheless, finding out what are cultured pearls really made me curious about the rest of the gem industry. I wanted to know if there is any equivalent to cultured pearls in other areas of jewelry. I was surprised when the answer was yes. There are fake diamonds, fake opals, and synthetic versions of most of the other gemstones. They are actually of a purer grade and a higher quality than the real things! Because of this fact, people are willing to pay more money for them. Human vanity never ceases to amaze me!
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