It is clear to see that the utilization of full body plates drastically increased and the usage of half body plates dramatically decreased. This is likely showing that these fish were heavily targeted, and therefore, needed to use better defensive mechanisms; hence the usage of full body plates compared to two-thirds or half. This is all showing these fish were likely prey for bigger fish, or perhaps non-marine predators as well.
As more protection for the stickleback fish was needed the more advantageous adaptation was more body plating, at first the two thirds body plating was rising in percentage and then the half body plating decreased then full body plating started appearing in more and more fish as the percentage of half body plating decreased significantly and the percentage of two thirds body plating leveled out
