The Coat-of-mail Chiton is a mollusc that has a soft brown body enclosed in a small oval-shaped shell and can be found on the west and south-west coasts of England.  It has the name ‘Coat-of-mail’ because it has eight overlapping plates on its shell which look like the plates of armour similar to those on a knight’s gauntlet.  It can be found in shallow waters and in waters as deep as fifty metres where it firmly attaches itself onto the underside of rocks. It can sometimes be found in rock pools.

The Coat-of-mail Chiton is  about three centimetres long and its body is protected by a shell which is usually a brown colour.  Sometimes the shell can be a combination of colours such as off-white, pink, yellow-brown and olive-green with a marbling effect.  The Coat-of-mail Chiton has a small mouth and very hard teeth which are used to grind food.  It also has a very strong muscular foot which it uses to move along surfaces and also to attach itself firmly onto rocks.  If it is removed, it curls itself up tightly to protect itself.

The Coat-of-mail Chiton lays its eggs directly into the water where they develop.  Larvae hatch out of the eggs and become part of zooplankton for a while before they settle on the seabed to develop into adult Coat-of-mail Chitons.