C ultured pearls are made in much the same way as natural pearls by utilizing a technique known as grafting . The grafting technique consists of introducing a perfectly round nucleus, fashioned from the shell of a mussel cultivated in the Mississippi, into the gonad of an oyster. A small piece of mantle from another oyster is inserted along with the graft. The cells from the sacrificed oyster develop around the implanted nucleus thus forming a pearl sack which, once closed, will secrete pearl material. Before undergoing this grafting process, the oyster submits to a fast for several days in order to slow down its metabolism which decreases the risk of rejection.
Many people still make the mistake of believing that cultured pearls are imitations or fake ones.
In other words, man plays the part of nature by introducing the irritant or nucleus into the oyster and then steps aside to allow nature to create its miracle. He settled in the Tuamotus and built a fare or bungalow on piles over the lagoon of Apataki where he carried out his studies. After failing to produce large numbers of the pearls in the 1930s, he brought in Japanese grafting specialists to help perfect the art of culturing pearls in Polynesia. Today, the Tahitian black pearl is the number one export item in French Polynesia. The Giant South Sea oysters that are found in the warms waters of the inter-tropical zone belong to the Pinctada family.