A species of stickleback which became an unlikely star after appearing on the BBC \u2018Springwatch\u2019 programme has gone on display at Deep Sea World, Scotland\u2019s national aquarium.
\nThe fifteen-spined, or sea stickleback, is the largest member of the stickleback family and can reach lengths of up to 20cms.
\nNative to UK waters they are most commonly found in the brackish waters of the Atlantic Ocean living among seaweed.
\nA shoal of 20 has been released in to the North Queensferry attraction\u2019s newly-completed Scottish Sea display which highlights the variety of native marine species.
\nDeep Sea World\u2019s Michael Morris said: \u201cEver since the BBC Springwatch programme last year featured \u2018Spineless Si\u2019 on their \u2018Stickleback Cam\u2019 the level of interest in the hitherto humble stickleback has increased significantly.
\n\u201cHopefully this new display will showcase them further and bring them to more people\u2019s attention.
\n\u201cThey are actually fascinating little fish with a surprisingly sophisticated social structure; particularly when it comes to reproducing,\u201d he added.
\nThe male sticklebacks build a nest by digging a small pit and then using special thread-like mucus around plants causing them to come together to create a nest.
\nThey then perform a zig-zag like mating dance around this nest to attract a female.
\nOnce inside the nest the female lays up to 300 peppercorn-sized eggs which the male externally fertilises.
\nHe then guards the eggs and fans them with his fins until they hatch. He continues to care for the fry until they have absorbed the contents of their egg yolks and can feed for themselves.
\nIssued by Deep Sea World. For more information and to arrange interviews and filming or picture opportunities please contact Nancy Sidhu or Michael Morris on 01383 411880 ext 101.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A species of stickleback which became an unlikely star after appearing on the BBC \u2018Springwatch\u2019 programme has gone on display at Deep Sea World, Scotland\u2019s national aquarium. The fifteen-spined, or sea stickleback, is the largest member of the stickleback family and can reach lengths of up to 20cms. Native to UK waters they are most … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":100981,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[71,65],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-animals","category-blog"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3576"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3576\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4272145510,"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3576\/revisions\/4272145510"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}