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b"Sign up for our mailing list! We also have t-shirts and mugs with our logo!\\n\\nThanks to Nicholas and Emma for their suggestions this week as we learn about some (nearly) indestructible animals!\\n\\nFurther listening:\\n\\nPatreon episode about Metal Animals (unlocked, no login required)\\n\\nFurther reading:\\n\\nEven a car can't kill this beetle. Here's why\\n\\nThe scaly-foot snail's shell is made of actual iron - and it's magnetic\\n\\nThe scaly-foot gastropod (pictures from article linked above):\\n\\n\\n\\nThe diabolical ironclad beetle is virtually unsquishable:\\n\\n\\n\\nLimpet shells:\\n\\n\\n\\nThe business side of a limpet:\\n\\n\\n\\nHighly magnified limpet teeth:\\n\\n\\n\\nShow transcript:\\nWelcome to Strange Animals Podcast. I\\u2019m your host, Kate Shaw.\\nThis week we\\u2019re going to learn about some indestructible animals, or at least animals that are incredibly tough. You may be surprised to learn that they\\u2019re all invertebrates. It\\u2019s a suggestion by Nicholas, and one of the animals Nicholas suggested was also suggested by Emma.\\nWe\\u2019ll start with that one, the scaly-foot gastropod, a deep-sea snail. We actually covered this one a few years ago but only in a Patreon episode. I went ahead and unlocked that episode so that anyone can listen to it, since I haven\\u2019t done that in a while, so the first part of this episode will sound familiar if you just listened to that one.\\nThe scaly-foot gastropod lives around three hydrothermal vents in the Indian Ocean, about 1 \\xbe miles below the surface, or about 2,800 meters. The water around these vents, referred to as black smokers, can be more than 350 degrees Celsius. That\\u2019s 660 degrees F, if you even need to know that that\\u2019s too hot to live.\\nThe scaly-foot gastropod was discovered in 2001 but not formally described until 2015. The color of its shell varies from almost black to golden to white, depending on which population it\\u2019s from, and it grows to almost 2 inches long, or nearly 5 cm. It doesn\\u2019t have eyes, and while it does have a small mouth, it doesn\\u2019t use it for eating. Instead, the snail contains symbiotic bacteria in a gland in its esophagus. The bacteria convert toxic hydrogen sulfide from the water around the hydrothermal vents into energy the snail uses to live. It\\u2019s a process called chemosynthesis. In return, the bacteria get a safe place to live.\\nThe snail\\u2019s shell contains an outer layer made of iron sulfides. Not only that, the bottom of the snail\\u2019s foot is covered with sclerites, or spiky scales, that are also mineralized with iron sulfides. While the snail can\\u2019t pull itself entirely into its shell, if something attacks it, the bottom of its foot is heavily armored and its shell is similarly tough.\\nResearchers are studying the scaly-foot gastropod\\u2019s shell to possibly make a similar composite material for protective gear and other items. The inner layer of the shell is made of a type of calcium carbonate, common in mollusk shells and some corals. The middle layer of the shell is regular snail shell material, organic periostracum, [perry-OSS-trickum] which helps dissipate heat as well as pressure from squeezing attacks, like from crab claws. And the outer layer, of course, is iron sulfides like pyrite and greigite. Oh, and since greigite is magnetic, the snails stick to magnets.\\nUnfortunately, the scaly-foot gastropod is endangered due to deep-sea mining around its small, fragile habitat. Hopefully conservationists can get laws passed to protect the thermal vents and all the animals that live around them.\\nThe scaly-foot gastropod is the only animal known that incorporates iron sulfide into its skeleton or exoskeleton, although our next indestructible animal, the diabolical ironclad beetle, has iron in its name.\\nThe diabolical ironclad beetle lives in western North America, especially in dry areas. It grows up to an inch long, or 25 mm, and is a dull black or dark gray in color with bumps and ridges that make it look like a piece of tree bark. Since it lives on trees,"