Bloody Stickleback

Diet and feeding

The FishTraits compilation records these diet categories for this species: algae or phytoplankton; invertebrates or larval fish. These are broad categories, not a claim that every individual consumes every example in a category.

Reported feeding positions include bottom feeding and surface or water-column feeding. The compilation combines published observations; diets can vary with age, locality, and available food.

Habitat preferences

Reported habitat associations include creeks, still-water habitats.

The source records associations with muck, clay or silt, sand, vegetation. An association indicates reported use, rather than an exclusive requirement.

The species is classified as tolerant of a broad range of salinities. This flag does not specify a salinity range for aquarium care.

Reproduction and parental care

The compilation reports a representative maturity age of 1 years. Its maturity field summarizes mean, median, or modal estimates, usually for females; male estimates can be used when female data are unavailable. It is not a fixed age at which every fish first breeds.

Recorded spawning months are May, Jun, Jul, Aug for the source’s reporting region (CN). This is a regional calendar, not a range-wide schedule.

Size and recorded longevity

FishTraits reports a maximum total length of 6.6 centimetres. Some entries use an estimated asymptotic length; this value should not be treated as a certified record catch.

Recorded longevity in the compilation is 2.3 years. Wild observations were preferred, but captive records were accepted where wild records were unavailable, and unspecified records were assumed wild. The value is not a guaranteed wild lifespan or an aquarium life expectancy.

Identification and appearance

The fourspine stickleback has a bony ridge on each side of the abdomen, making it triangular in cross-section, with flat belly and sharp back; it is fusiform from the side view, tapering to a pointed nose and to a slim caudal peduncle. There are two to four free dorsal spines standing close one behind the other, inclining alternately to one side or the other; another spine is attached to the dorsal fin by the fin membrane; the anal fin is similarly preceded by an attached spine, and each ventral fin is represented by a stouter curved spine, strongly saw-edged, followed by about two slender rays. The dorsal fin stands over the anal as in the nine-spined species, but both these fins are more rounded in outline, while the caudal fin is relatively longer and narrower than in any of our other stickleback species. Further details are provided in Scott and Crossman (1973); Smith (1985); Robins et al. (1986); Page and Burr (1991).

Native range

Europe and the Atlantic coast of North America. Atlantic Slope from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to Trent River system, North Carolina. Mostly a nearshore marine species, but far inland populations occur in lakes in Nova Scotia, and in Hudson, Delaware, and Susquehanna River drainages (Page and Burr 1991).

Habitat and ecology

Apeltes quadracus often live sympatrically with other species of stickleback throughout their native range, though they are generally solitary with regard to other members of their own species. Individuals are often observed perched among bottom debris and vegetation, never in open water, hovering over a patch of substrate, picking at it frequently, then moving on to another patch (Delbeek and Williams 1987). Delbeek and Williams (1987) also found that fourspine stickleback fed exclusively on the bottom, wither among benthic vegetation or from the substrate, the most abundant organisms in their diets being diatoms, nauplii, nematodes, ostracods, and cyclopods. During spawning, the males of this species establish territories and build small nests in which females lay their eggs (Courtenay 1985). Them male then chases the female away and cares for the eggs until they hatch. Courtenay (1985) also found that, unlike other stickleback species, male Apeltes tend multiple nests at one time in both laboratory and natural breeding site observations. Fourspine stickleback also has the widest range of salinity tolerance of any North American species of stickleback (Holm and Hamilton 1988).

Introduction history

Bait shops in Alabama were found to be selling stickleback mixed in with fathead minnows at the time the specimens were collected (N. Nichols, pers. comm.).

Ecological impacts

Confined to coasts. Rapid increases of Apeltes in Thunder Bay suggests the species is displacing native stickleback species at a rapid rate (Stephenson and Momot 2000).