Culaea inconstans
(Kirtland, 1840) · speciesAt a glance
Sources12 archives
Databases and archives Culaea inconstans's data was compiled from.
WikipediaWikimedia Foundation7 languages↗
Animal Diversity WebUniv. of Michigan MZspecies account↗
BioWikiNetmultilingual Wikipediamultilingual↗
GBIFGlobal Biodiversity Information Facility8 050 records↗
ENAEuropean Nucleotide Archive · EMBL-EBI301 eDNA detections↗
BOLD SystemsCentre for Biodiversity Genomics190 specimens↗
Open Tree of LifeOpenTreephylogeny backbone↗
GoaTGenomes on a Tree · Sangergenome & karyotype↗
Tree of SexTree of Sex Consortiumgenome & karyotype↗
WikidataWikimedia Foundationstructured facts↗
Catalogue of LifeCOLtaxonomy↗
GLoBIGlobal Biotic Interactionsbiotic interactions↗Every layer below draws on the sources above — open one to explore it, or use ← → to move between tabs.
The brook stickleback (Culaea inconstans) is a small freshwater fish that is distributed across the US and Canada. It grows to a length of about 2 inches. It occupies the northern part of the eastern United States, as well as the southern half of Canada. Small populations are scattered throughout the Mississippi-Great Lakes basin extending to Colorado, New Mexico, Kentucky, Tennessee, etc., though some of these areas are not native to the species. This small fish inhabits clear, cool streams and lakes. They eat small invertebrates, algae, insect larvae, and occasionally their own eggs. They are also preyed upon by smallmouth bass and northern pike. Feeding time is usually dawn and sunset. The brook stickleback does have active competition mostly from minnows, but feeding times are different, along with diet.Stewart, D.B. 2007. Fish diets and food webs in the Northwest Territories: brook stickleback (Culaea inconstans). Canadian Manuscript Report of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 2798: 1-17 Spawning occurs in midsummer. Males secure a territory, build a nest, and mate with females. Males provide protection for the eggs, ward off predators, and usually die later in the season. This is considered an annual species. The nests are built out of aquatic grasses.Acere, T.O. 1986. Age, growth and life history of Culaea inconstans (Pisces: Gasterostidae) in Delta Marsh Lake Manitoba. Hydrobiologia 135: 35-44 Though the brook stickleback is not considered a threatened species, deforesting and changing waters are altering ecosystems of the species. Harvesting of trees around riparian environments is having a large effect of the stream ecosystem where the brook stickleback resides.Chizinski, C. J. 2010. The influence of partial timber harvesting in riparian buffers on macroinvertebrate and fish communities in small streams in Minnesota, USA. Forest Ecology and Management 259: 1946-1958
No narrative description available for this taxon yet.
Size & morphology1
Life cycle & reproduction1
Habitat & environment2
Uses & economy1
Other traits3
A DNA barcode is a short, standardised stretch of genes that works like a fingerprint — enough to tell one species from another. Below is the molecular trace Culaea inconstans has left across the world's sequence archives.
At a glance
★ the standard DNA barcode for this group — the short region actually read to tell this species apart. The rest are extra genes sequenced along the way.
Besides the big genome in the nucleus, cells carry a small, circular loop of DNA inside the cell's energy factories — the mitochondria. It is inherited almost only from the mother and is a leftover from ancient bacteria that moved into the cell. The mitochondrial markers above (ND*, COX, CYTB…) are read from exactly this loop. Outer ring = one strand, inner ring = the other.
The complete instruction manual Culaea inconstans carries — its genome. We read it from three angles — how big it is, how the DNA is packed into chromosomes, and how completely it has been sequenced — and explain how to read each value as you go.
Genome sizehow big the whole instruction manual is
Measured in base pairs (bp) — the individual letters of DNA (human ≈ 3.2 Gb, a bacterium a few million). The chart places this genome on a logarithmic scale — each step to the right is ten times bigger — among reference organisms. Across species a bigger genome loosely tracks with larger cells, slower growth and lower-energy lifestyles (powered flight favours small genomes) — yet it does not imply more genes or a more advanced organism (the long-standing C-value paradox).
Chromosomes & ploidyhow the DNA is packaged
2n is the full chromosome count in a normal body cell; n is a gamete (egg or sperm), which carries half. Ploidy is how many complete chromosome sets each cell holds — 2× (diploid) is typical for animals, while higher levels (polyploidy) are common in plants. Click any value below to see the underlying records and sources.
2n 464×GoaT · Tree of Sex Database · GoaT · Animal Genome Size Database · TreeOfSex · vert
How far back this lineage goes — and how we know. Everything here is measured in Ma, short for “mega-annum”: millions of years ago. The chart reads left to right like a calendar of the Earth, from the deep past on the left to today at the right edgetop to bottom like a core drilled through the Earth, from the deep past at the top down to today at the bottom.
At a glance
When this lineage existed
How to read this: the coloured strip along the bottomdown the left is the geological calendar — the standard epochs (Pliocene, Pleistocene…) every museum uses, shown so you can see which chapter of Earth's history this lineage lived in. This lineage is a young one, so the strip is zoomed in to epochs — the finer subdivisions inside a period. The orange marker is the DNA clock: DNA accumulates mutations at a roughly steady rate, so comparing this species' DNA with its relatives estimates when the lineage split off — independently of any fossil.
Record type8 050 records
Origin
Range
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Museum / Voucheredphysical evidence
Backed by a physical specimen — a herbarium sheet, sample or voucher held in a collection. “Vouchered” means supported by material evidence, not just an observation.
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Holding institutions17 of 47 geolocated
Institutions and collections holding physical, vouchered specimens of this species — click a row to fly to it on the map.
| Institution | Specimens |
|---|---|
| University of Alberta Museumslocation not on record | 957 |
| Toronto, CA | 693 |
| Museo civico La Terra e l'Uomo di Crocetta del Montellolocation not on record | 612 |
| University of Minnesota, James Ford Bell Museum of Natural Historylocation not on record | 607 |
| Ann Arbor, US | 546 |
| Ohio State University - Fish Division, Columbus, OH (OSUM)location not on record | 224 |
| Champaign, US | 160 |
| Chicago, US | 158 |
| University of Texas Biodiversity Collections (UTBC)location not on record | 69 |
| München, DE | 59 |
| University of Nebraska State Museumlocation not on record | 53 |
| Vancouver, CA | 52 |
| Washington, US | 46 |
| Royal Saskatchewan Museumlocation not on record | 33 |
| ISUAlocation not on record | 31 |
| University of Guelph, Centre for Biodiversity Genomicslocation not on record | 28 |
| Tempe, US | 26 |
| University of Alabamalocation not on record | 25 |
| Central Michigan University Museum of Cultural and Natural Historylocation not on record | 24 |
| Florida Museum of Natural History- Zoology, Paleontology & Paleobotanylocation not on record | 18 |
| Fort Hays State University, Sternberg Museumlocation not on record | 18 |
| New Haven, US | 17 |
| Cambridge, US | 16 |
| Montgomery, US | 15 |
| North Carolina Museum of Natural Scienceslocation not on record | 9 |
| University of Wyoming Museum of Vertebrateslocation not on record | 8 |
| Iowa City, US | 8 |
| Royal Ontario Museumlocation not on record | 7 |
| ASUlocation not on record | 6 |
| Wuzhou, CN | 5 |
| Helsinki, FI | 5 |
| University of California San Diegolocation not on record | 4 |
| University of Victorialocation not on record | 4 |
| Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural Historylocation not on record | 4 |
| Maurice Lamontagne Institutelocation not on record | 3 |
| Texas Memorial Museum, Texas Natural History Collectionlocation not on record | 2 |
| FishBaselocation not on record | 2 |
| Sydney, AU | 2 |
| Texas Cooperative Wildlife Collectionlocation not on record | 2 |
| Florida State University Coastal and Marine Laboratorylocation not on record | 1 |
| UWFClocation not on record | 1 |
| Stockholm, SE | 1 |
| University of Kansas, Biodiversity Research Centerlocation not on record | 1 |
| Museu Nacional/Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeirolocation not on record | 1 |
| Louisiana State University, Museum of Zoologylocation not on record | 1 |
| Paris, FR | 1 |
| Dalhousie Universitylocation not on record | 1 |
Where the DNA of Culaea inconstans was picked up in samples of water, soil or air — nobody saw the organism, only its DNA left behind. A trace is a clue that the species was near, not a confirmed sighting.
Signal
Where its DNA was found
How strong is each trace?
Modelled climatemodelled
How to read this: each dot is one detection of this species' DNA in an environmental sample. The confidence meter weighs how many independent studies and places back up the signal — one detection in one study is a hint; many across several studies is solid. Records dated before 2008 (when eDNA methods began) are treated as likely mislabeled and left off the map.