Trimming Pearls? A Q for the Experts

[Sarah]

I bought a loose strand of freshwater nucleated pearls, Chinese kasumi style. I love them! Upon very close inspection, I noticed that some of them look like they once had thin tails that were trimmed off to make the pearls appear more round. However, these trimmed areas aren't jagged or exposed. They're seamlessly covered with iridescent nacre. Is trimming pearls and re-implanting them a known practice? If so, is it accepted and how much does it impact the value of the pearls?

Maybe I'm imagining things, or maybe this has been discussed before. If not, I can follow up with photos later.

 

[pearlescence]

can you show us a photo of where you think this happened?
The kasumi-ish pearls have lots of folds and wrinkles as normal. I reckon that they don't sell for enough to make big efforts in preparing them worthwhile

 

[Sarah]

Your wish is my command. I should have saved a photo of the overall strand because it's actually very beautiful. Not all of the pearls have this trimmed appearance, but here are the three that stand out best to me. It's like they were snipped off with toenail clippers, but the exposed surfaces are healed.

Pearl 1
This doesn't seem like a natural shape for a tail to me. This one is not as fully healed as the others, but the nacre does flow over the edge into the lengthwise seam.



Pearl 2
This has a nice curved contour but still seems rather thick and blunt at the end. It's fully covered with nacre.



Pearl 3
This one almost looks like it was trimmed in three sections. There are obvious corners where the sections meet.

 

[pattye]

Most likely it is not trimmed in any way; probably a factor of the placement of the nucleus and how it grew within the body.

 

[Marianne]

Agree with Pattye. Will try and get some decent photos of the same formation in the next few days. Just seems to be the way some of them grow.