Stickleback, the Common, Banstickle, or Sharpling, Gasterosteus aculeatus, L. a well -known fish, abounding in newly-cut ditches, canals, and other collections of water. It seldom exceeds two or three inches in length : the back is covered with sharp spines ; and, like its sides, is of an olive-green : the belly is perfectly white. Numerous shoals of sticklebacks inhabit the fens of Lincolnshire, and the adjoining rivers, where experiments have been made to express oil from these diminutive creatures ; but, we conceive, they may be more profitably employed as manure. - See vol. iii. p. 153.