stickleback

Other forms of stickleback

plural

sticklebacks·

Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.

Questions about stickleback

What does stickleback mean?

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

How many syllables are in stickleback?

stickleback has 3 syllables: stic-kle-back. The stress falls on "stic".

What is another word for stickleback?

Close synonyms include prickleback. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is stickleback a common word?

stickleback is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.