What's inside a clam? A retractable foot, a siphon for sucking up water, powerful muscles, and, sometimes, a pearl. And you thought ... mollusk that's encased in a shell made of two valves ...

Pearls are formed inside a mussel or oyster (or any mollusk with a shell) as a form of self-defense—their beauty is, amazingly, secondary to their function. When a mollusk senses that its shell ...

To culture freshwater mussels, workers slightly open their shells, cut small slits into the mantle tissue inside both shells ... old Buddhas are not true pearls but shell mabes.

Pearls are made by marine oysters and freshwater mussels as a natural defence against an irritant such as a parasite entering their shell or damage to their fragile body. The oyster or mussel slowly ...

The shiny layer inside the shell is called the nacre, or mother of pearl. HABITAT: Freshwater mussels live on river bottoms and most require clean, flowing water to survive and reproduce. RANGE: ...

Cultured pearls are formed by the same process, but instead of the irritant entering the shell accidentally ... layers of growth from the very inside out. More from So Expensive ...

These translucent animals are known to swim inside clams and oysters to ... the same substances that are in its calcium carbonate shell, the mollusc creates a material called nacre, commonly known as ...