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Snail that produces £30,000 pearls under tight security

Monday, 8 September 2008

An aquarium in Britain has splashed out on a painstaking security operation to protect one of its more unusual exhibits.

A giant sea snail is being closely guarded at Birmingham's National Sea Life Centre.

It can produce rare and valuable pearls which can fetch up to £30,000 each.

"These snails occasionally produce pearls which can fetch anything between £5,000 and £30,000 each," said curator Graham Burrows.

"The snail forms the pearl around any foreign object that gets inside its shell. The biggest one recorded was the size of a golf-ball."

The sea snail is about 20 times bigger than the British garden equivalent.

"Of course only a very few snails contain pearls, and the odds are very much against our snail having one," Mr Burrows said.

"With the prices they can fetch, however, we need to be extra vigilant to make sure no one is tempted to kidnap the snail in the hope that it contains hidden treasure.

"We've also got CCTV covering every possible access point when we're closed, as well as a sophisticated alarm system," Mr Burrows said.

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Some years ago while I was staying in Asia I was invited on a shipping/diving trip with the local fisherman.

After many dives the divers started bringing up basket loads of black pearls. I queried how they were finding these pearls, since I was doubting if the pearls were real.

Anyway to cut a long story short, the next diver brought to the surface a large sea snail. In front of my eyes he proceeded to remove the flesh and to my surprise a large black pearl was found.

When I returned to the UK I brought some of these pearls back with me with a photo of the sea snail. When I went to a local jeweller to get an estimate on the value of the pearls, the guy literally fell off his chair laughing, guess he did not believe me that the pearls came from sea snails.

Anyway that put me off trying to sell the pearls, they remain in my possession, some as big as 10p, all coloured black.

NOW AM I TO BELIEVE THE PEARLS I HAVE IN MY POSSESSION ARE REAL AND VERY VALUABLE ?

Posted by JOHN | 15.09.08, 19:38 GMT

Let's be serious for a minute. Let's suppose your "giant sea snail" is a Queen Conch (Strombus gigas) which is the sea snail that most commonly produces pearls ("most commonly" is relative as most other snails usually don't produce pearls of any value at all). There's one chance in 10,000 that it will produce a pearl, and one chance out of 10 that the pearl will be of gem quality. In short, one chance out of 100,000 that the snail is worth more than just a fritter.

Is this really worth the "painstaking security operation"?

Posted by Pecheur de Perles | 09.09.08, 22:29 GMT