76 On the Habits and Food of the Stickleback. 



capable of converting deciduous leaved trees into evergreens, 

 or the reverse. In cold climates, vegetation is interrupted by 

 winter. Jn warm climates, plants experience not such in- 

 terruptions. It may therefore be asked, Will a warm climate 

 alter the character of the leaves of certain trees, so far as to 

 change a deciduous into an annual or perennial leaf ? Or is 

 there a source of deception arising from the continued vegeta- 

 tion exhibiting trees as evergreens, though in fact their leaves 

 be deciduous ? An affirmative answer to the latter question, 

 will probably be found an expression of the truth. 



Manse of Flisk, 

 4<th November 1825. 



Art. XIII. — On the Habits and Food of the Stickleback. 

 From a Correspondent. 



In Volume III. of the Journal of Science, p. 74, Mr Ra- 

 mage of Aberdeen has given an account of a stickleback, 

 which was taken alive with a leech " fully as large as the 

 stickleback itself" in its intestines. The leech, " in a few 

 minutes, 11 was protruded by the anal opening, and crrwled on 

 Mr Ram age's hand; but, " the stickleback died almost imme- 

 diately after giving birth to this strange offspring, and the 

 leech survived it only about twelve hours." The appearance 

 and motion of the leech, it is added, " corresponded, in every 

 respect, with those of the common leech, excepting that the 

 colour was entirely white." The theory offered to account 

 for this fact is, " that the leech was lodged in the small gut, and 

 most probably had been swallowed by the stickleback for food 

 when of a small size, and had grown to its present dimensions 

 in tli£ stickleback's belly, after having been swallowed." The 

 leech and the stickleback were transmitted to the museum of 

 the Royal Society of Edinburgh. 



Upon this detail, it may be remarked, that the circum- 

 stance of a stickleback swallowing a leech is no uncommon 

 one, for young leeches seem to be the favourite food of the 

 three-spined stickleback, Gasterosteus aculcatus, Lin. My 

 boys had several sticklebacks alive for some months during 



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