This church bell summons the faithful in a small lakeside town in Mexico, a town with a

remarkable story of animal conservation combined with religion.

I'm BBC Science Correspondent Victoria Gill, and this is Discovery from the BBC World Service.

A critically endangered creature called an axe-lottal may owe its survival to a story of paradoxes and of unusual unexpected relationships.

Probably is the only religious community involved in amphibian conservation.

Talking about, you know, convent with nuns,

actual adults, scientific researchers,

it looks like an impossible cocktail.

Seemingly impossible saviors of a strange slimy salamander with seemingly impossible abilities,

like regrowing lost limbs or even a damaged brain.

The incredible, incredibly endangered Lake Patsquaro Axolotel.

You name it, it is hitting the wild Axolotel and we have seen a precipitous decline in the species in the wild.

The populations are really, really low, so it's really in danger of extinction.

And so it's nuns to the rescue.

In any convent you'd expect a chapel where the sisters gather to worship.

But in the heart of this one is a room that's rather less orthodox,

lined with tanks and tubs that bubble with cool water from the

convents well. It's home to hundreds of very rare aquatic amphibians, all

raised here by the Sisters of Immaculate Health, a true salamander sanctuary.

We have the biosecurity, fresh pristine water, organic food that they produce

themselves for the animals, and at the same time fully dedicated community

for keeping salamanders that is almost like a dream for any conservationist, a convent for saving

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