The Tahiti Pearl Cultivation Process

Today's pearl farms have replaced the diving industry of past Polynesian generations (see photo). Patient breeding techniques have replaced the devastating collection of oyster shells by divers.

But long before anyone considered breeding Pinctada margaritifera oysters for grafting to produce the black pearl, Man intervened in Nature's process in several attempts to increase the mother-of-pearl's population that many seasons of diving had made rarer and rarer.

By the end of the 19th century it became clear that in order to save the species it was necessary to control the collection of the breeding beds.However, it was not until 1953 that Gilbert Ranson, deputy director of the Museum of Paris and an oyster expert, came to Papeete and proposed regulations and guidelines to create natural reserves in the lagoons --using "spat" collectors-- to replenish depleted oyster stocks.

In 1976 the Department of Fisheries became involved in Ranson's program.
And if the species is saved today, after being so close to disappearing, it was not without much effort and decades of hard work.

Photo Source (right top): "La Magie de la Perle Noire", P. Salomon and M. Roudnitska