Jordan and Evermann. Fishes of North America. 747 



1098. GASTEROSTEUS ACULEATUS, Linnaeus. 

 (EUROPEAN STICKLEBACK; BURNSTICKLE.) 



Head 3 to 3^ ; depth 4 ; eye 3f to 4 ; snout 3. Body rather stout, head 

 short, snout short, mouth oblique, maxillary not reaching eye ; caudal 

 peduncle depressed, keeled or not. Dorsal spines short and stout, usu- 

 ally a little shorter than snout and strongly serrate ; ventral spines about 

 as long as from tip of snout to pupil, serrate on each side, and with strong 

 basal cusp; ventral plate broad and long, longer than ventral spines or 

 about as long as snout and eye; processes from shoulder girdle widely 

 divergent inclosing a large triangular area. Lateral armature variable, 

 the plates 6 to 32, usually none on caudal peduncle ; in fresh-water speci- 

 mens caudal keel generally present but fleshy ; in unarmed specimens the 

 posterior plates when present on the caudal peduncle are much reduced in 

 size. The variation in the sticklebacks of Europe is very great, as was 

 pointed out by Day* some years ago. This is also shown by the studies 

 which Dr. Boulenger has recently made of the sticklebacks of England. 

 The various partly naked forms are not susceptible of definition even as 

 varieties. Coasts and streams of northern Europe; abundant. We 

 include this form in the present memoir on the supposition that the mailed 

 form in Greenland, Gasterosteus loricatus, Reinhardt, belongs to it. (acu- 

 leatus, spined.) (Eu.) 



Gasterosteus aculeatm, LINNAEUS, Syst. Nat.. Ed. x, 1758, 489, Europe; completely mailed. 

 Gasterosteus trachurus, CUVIEB & VALENCIENNES, Hist. Nat. Poiss., iv, 481, 1829, France; com- 

 pletely mailed; 31 plates. 

 Gasterosteus ponticus, NORDMANN, in Demidoff, Voy. Russ. Merid., HI, 357, Tauria and Black 



Sea; plates fewer than in aculealus. 

 Gasterosteus semiarmatus, CUVIER & VALENCIENNES, Hist. Nat. Poiss., iv, 493, 1829, Havre; 14 



plates. 

 Gasterosteus semiloricaius, CUVIER & VALENCIENNES, Hist. Nat. Poiss., iv, 494, 1829, Baillon; 13 



plates. 



Gaslerosteus leiurus, CUVIER & VALENCIENNES, Hist. Nat. Poiss., iv, 481, 1829, Seine; 6 plates. 

 t Gasterosteus loricatus, REINHARDT, Fauna Grcenlandica, 32, 37, 1837, Greenland; fully armed; 



may be G. bispinosus. 



Gasterosteus bailloni, BLANCHARD, Poissons des eaux douces de France, 231, 1866, Abbeville. 

 Gasterosteus neustrianus, BLANCHARD, Poissons des eaux douces de France, 220, 1866, Harfleur; 



armature interrupted. 

 Gasterosleus argentissimus, BLANCHARD, Poissons des eaux douces de France, 232, 1866, Avignon; 



6 plates. 



*Dr. Francis Day observes: "It appears remarkable how many species of sticklebacks have 

 been named, outnumbering even those of the Salmonidse of the fresh waters, and it becomes a 

 first consideration whether any general principles are perceptible in the distribution of these 

 species or varieties. It is in the ocean more than in fresh waters that we must seek the spiny- 

 rayed fishes; and similarly it is on the seaboards or skirts of the ocean that we must look for 

 sticklebacks in which the armature of the sides is most developed (as in the variety trachurus), 

 while such as have the free portion of the tail unarmed are farthest inland or on elevated pla- 

 teaus; while in the center of Ireland I have captured examples of G. pumjitius in which the arma- 

 ture had so decreased that the ventral spine waa entirely absent. It has been pointed out (Phil. 

 Mag., 1834, v, p. 299) that the variety on the continent with the shortest spine or the most 

 defenseless form, conies from Tuscany, and is peculiar to still waters, where it would have the 

 fewest enemies, and here it attains to a great size. Taking large numbers of Irish specimens I 

 found considerable differences in the length of the ventral spines and pubic plates, conclusively 

 showing that such characters afford no reliable data. 



" Heckel and Kner, in their account of the fishes of Austria, did not admit the foregoing to be 

 more than varieties differentiated by the development of the lateral scutes or plates, which they 

 found varied in number between 3 and 28.'' Day. 



