3760 Fishes. 



Note on Gasterosteous leiurus, or probably G. trachurus. — I was much pleased with 

 the observations of Mr. Warington in your last number (Zool. 3633), on the stickle- 

 back (Gasterosteus leiurus), as confirmatory of some remarks on that fish when kept in 

 confinement, made by me in Loudon's ' Magazine of Natural History,' (iii. 329). It 

 is some time since I had an opportunity of observing the habits of this very interest- 

 ing fish ; but I can add my testimony to almost all that Mr. Warington has written. 

 Their pugnacious propensities appear to last only during the season of spawning, and 

 the extreme brilliancy and beauty of the male fish ceases with this amatory period. 

 Mr. Yarrell says that at this period both sexes exhibit " more than usual brilliancy ; * 

 but I have never observed any difference in the appearance of the female, except when 

 full of spawn. Their ferocity, and tyranny over their vanquished fellow-prisoners, 

 must be witnessed to be credited. Mr. Warington might have related how skilfully 

 and often fatally they use their lateral spines in their combats. Previously to an en- 

 counter it is a most pleasing sight to witness the attitudes of the two combatants, — 

 sparring as it were, and watching for an unguarded part in the opponent, and then dart- 

 ing upon him with surprising velocity. They swim round and round each other, with 

 their spines projected, before the assault is made. I once had in confinement, with 

 some of the other species, the Gasterosteus pungitius, which becomes coal black dur- 

 ing the spawning season. This species is usually smaller, and their sides less bony 

 and hard than the other species. An encounter took place between this black fellow 

 and a fine and beautiful specimen of another species ; and, after an unusually pro- 

 tracted fight, the black hero was overcome and sank to the bottom of the tub, literally 

 ripped open by one of the spines of his opponent, and shortly after died. This I my- 

 self witnessed. When one has been beaten and driven from the position he had ap- 

 propriated to himself in his place of confinement, — which he seldom yields without a 

 struggle, generally occasioned by one invading the territory of the other, — his gay co- 

 lours fade, and he unites himself with some other brethren who have either been si- 

 milarly conquered, or, for some other reason, have not assumed the gay colours and 

 fighting propensities of the others. This unfortunate squad is generally driven into 

 an unoccupied corner of their prison, where they are wantonly and continually perse- 

 cuted by their congeners. The mouths of these fish are armed with rows of exceed- 

 ingly minute and sharp-pointed teeth, and a wound inflicted by these on the tail is 

 often followed by death. The wounded part at first becomes white, then increases in 

 extent, until the whole fish is covered with a furry-looking fungus ; and as the fish 

 sickens in death, the beautiful colours which had faded, as they always do after the 

 fish are vanquished, re-appear, but not with their original brightness, and without that 

 glowing and animated appearance which they exhibited when in health and vigour. 

 I have never had an opportunity of witnessing their nest-building operations, but have 

 frequently seen the male fish swimming about with a piece of ligneous fibre in his 

 mouth, as Mr. Warington mentions. The eggs are hatched in March or April, as I 

 have taken the young fry about June, entangled in the green silky weed found in all 

 ponds. The adult fish will greedily devour their own fry, which they seize and 

 swallow after the manner and with the voracity of the pike. They are said to survive 

 three years, but T never could ascertain the correctness of this conjecture. It is so 

 long since I kept these fish in confinement, and never having examined them scienti- 

 fically, that I am unable to say with certainty to which species my remarks apply, but 

 most likely to more than one. I only know that my specimens were caught in two 

 ponds at the back of the Hackney road, called " Bunker's Ponds," and well known to 



