Link Centre Dictionary

stickleback

stick·le·back

uncommon

noun

1.

small (2-4 inches) pugnacious mostly scaleless spiny-backed fishes of northern fresh and littoral waters having elaborate courtship; subjects of much research

Synonyms

Origin

From dialectal stickle (“a prickle, spine, sting”), from Old English sticel + bæc. See stick (transitive verb) and compare banstickle.

Related words

Broader terms

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Parts

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.