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Home > Fish and Wildlife Service News >
Iowa Department of Natural Resources
Wipers Are Coming OnIowa Department of Natural Resources — 7/18/2006Calls to the Macbride office pick up this time each summer; anglers asking about Iowa's white bass record (3 pounds, 14 ounces by the way) or just 'what is this big fish?'' that they just caught. If they think it's a white bass, they're half right. Wipers are a hybrid; eggs from ocean striped bass crossed in hatcheries with male white bass. Stocked in reservoir settings; they grow quickly, feeding on shad populations. It's not uncommon to pull in a 10-pounder or a sagging stringer of 4 to 5 pounders. I had a call a week ago from a Cedar Rapids angler whose son had hauled in one weighing over 13 pounds. A 19-pound, 10-ounce wiper taken from the Des Moines River a few years ago is the state record. And while your heart will be pumping as you bring that big, white bass near-look alike over the boat transom, you're probably looking at its hybrid cousin. "If it is over 16 inches, it's probably a wiper," advises Mack, though noting that 17-inch white bass have come out of Pleasant Creek Lake in his area. While each is predominately white; side-by-side comparison tells them apart. Wipers have a bold stripe pattern. White bass stripes are less pronounced. Wipers take on more of a sleek 'torpedo' shape. "The most obvious difference, though, is the tongue patch," says Mack. "On a white bass, there is a 'U' shaped patch on the top of the tongue. On a wiper, the patch resembles two small unconnected ovals." As hybrids, wipers do not reproduce. Hatcheries keep a steady stream of fry and fingerlings coming, though. Iowa gets its wipers from states like Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska, which hatch and stock them in larger reservoirs. It's usually a swap of surplus stock. "We traded walleye eggs to Oklahoma for their surplus wiper fry," says Mike Mason, DNR hatcheries program supervisor. "(Most) were stocked in Saylorville. The remainder went to our Mt. Ayr Hatchery, to be raised to a larger size." Larger, 1 to 1.5 inch fingerlings are released in some settings to increase survival prospects. The Macbride crew drove to Nebraska to bring back 62,000 fingerlings in June. Half went into Macbride, the other half in Coralville. They'll be catchable in two years. Smaller fry from Delaware were also stocked in Macbride. One reason many anglers are surprised when they hook a wiper is that it's not really a fish you 'go fishing for.' Mack might pick one up a wiper while trolling for walleye and will then start fishing for them. "They seem to relate to deeper rock. They are following the shad. You can look for shad on the surface. Just troll shad-colored (chrome, silver or white) crankbaits," says Mack. "During mid summer, they're on a feeding frenzy; the warmer water means their metabolism is higher. They have to eat more. They're going after this year's shad hatch." In eastern Iowa, Coralville Reservoir provides the big water setting. However, Lake Macbride, adjacent to the Reservoir, offers better fishing, this summer. And if you can afford an extra tank of $3 a gallon gas, you might point west. "Lake Manawa (near Council Bluffs) has really excellent wiper fishing this year," advises Mason. "We've been stocking there for a couple years and they have really taken off there."
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