Ninespine stickleback stickleback species, such as the Brook Stickleback. Ninespine stickleback The ninespine stickleback ("Pungitius pungitius"), also called the ten-spined stickleback, is a freshwater species of fish in the family Gasterosteidae that inhabits temperate waters. It is widely but locally distributed throughout Eurasia and North America. Despite its name, the number of spines can vary from 8 to 12. The body of the ninespine stickleback tapers to a very narrow caudal peduncle and the caudal fin is fan-shaped. The body is less deep and more elongated than that of the three-spined stickleback with a thinner and longer caudal peduncle, but the best
Breitensteinia in five to six longitudinal rows on each side, a dorsal profile rising evenly but not steeply from the tip of snout to the origin of dorsal fin and then sloping gently ventrally from there to the caudal peduncle, a horizontal ventral profile to the origin of the anal fin and then rising to the caudal peduncle, a dorsal fin origin nearer to the tip of the snout than caudal flexure, and a truncate caudal fin. "B. hypselurus" has a smooth posterior edge to its dorsal fin spine, relatively tall neural spines on the caudal vertebrae, a shorter caudal peduncle,