Fishes that Build Nests 



411 



Nest of Ten-spined Stickleback. 

 Female preparing to enter a nest to lay her eggs. After Coste 



reached a size which he considers to be 

 sufficient to enable them to wander away 

 and seek their own living. 



The stickleback is very common in 

 America and Europe, varieties of this 

 tiny fish being found in almost every per- 

 manent body of water, however small. 



One instance illustrative of their occa- 

 sional extraordinary numbers has been 

 often quoted, but is as apt now as ever. 

 In 1776 Pennant claimed that "once in 

 seven or eight years amazing shoals ap- 

 pear in the Welland" Canal "and come 



up the river in the form of a vast col- 

 umn. They are supposed to be the mul- 

 titudes which have been washed out of 

 the fens by the floods of several years 

 and collected in some deep hole till, over- 

 charged with numbers, they are periodi- 

 cally obliged to attempt a change of place. 

 The quantity is so great that they are 

 used to manure the land, and trials have 

 been made to get oil from them. A notion 

 may be had of this vast shoal by saying 

 that a man employed by the farmer to 

 take them has got for a considerable 



