September 10, 2024 5:02 PM

Italy oyster farmers dream of pearls from warming Mediterranean

Pearls may soon be cultivated in European seas for the first time ever, as Italian oyster farmers seek to exploit an unexpected opportunity offered by the rapidly warming Mediterranean. In late 2023, the first specimens of Pinctada radiata, a pearl oyster native to the Red Sea, were spotted in the Gulf of Poets, a popular tourist area around 100 kilometers (62 miles) from Genoa on Italy's north-western coast. Less than a year later, they are proliferating in what have always been some of the M...