Pearl farm makes incredibly rare find inside a single oyster

A pearl farm has discovered a rare treasure trove of 10 pearls inside a single oyster.

The mollusc was found at Cygnet Bay Pearl Farm, which has been run by four generations of the Brown family in the far north Kimberley region near Broome, WA.

“The pearls we found range in size from four to five millimetres to two or three times that. So they’re actually big pearls as well which is the other quirky thing about this,” Third generation pearl farmer James Brown told the ABC.

“We’ve got these 10, quite lustrous, very saleable pearls out of this strange pearl oyster,” Mr Brown said.

The oyster, of the Pinctada Maxima species, was found in one of Cygnet Bay Pearl Farm’s oyster beds along the north western coastline of Australia.

While pearls can occur naturally in oysters, Mr Brown suspects that the 10 pearls were cultured due to their placement near the oyster’s genital region.

“So the fact that most of them were clustered together in that gonad region probably does point to the fact that it was an artefact of an attempt to culture a pearl.”

He stated that natural pearls are usually placed near the extremities of the oyster.

For now, the pearls will go on display at the farm, while Mr Brown decides whether to sell them or turn them into jewellery.