Most anglers don't wake up for a day of fishing and worry about their wardrobe. Although, recent studies show that what a fisherman wears in rivers and streams could affect the waters for years.

Eyes closed as ice-cold water laps at the shore, one woman is transported to her bayou porch. Staring out at an enormous iceberg, some laugh, convinced it could pass for a Mardi Gras float. Inside a visitor's center, they see a decades-old photograph of an oil-slicked bird and agree: It looks just like the ones back home.

Three times a year, Fisheries Service officials wet their index fingers and hold them in the air to see which way the wind is blowing. They offer up suggestions for wholesale changes or modifications to fishing regulations or offer up something totally new.

The 418-acre expanse on the north side of the Coquille River was once a thriving wetland, home to shorebirds and salmon smolts alike. But as they have at countless other tidal marshes on the coast, farmers built dikes along the river decades ago, to keep the land mostly dry and suitable for grazing.