More Peanut Butter; Clamming Closes South; Siuslaw Watershed Receives Award

More Peanut Butter

Brian Johnston with Johnston Motor Company and Lisa Fassler and Brian Barnard with Grocery Outlet

The Annual Ford Peanut Butter Drive culminated with a final push from Johnston Motor Company.  On Friday, Brian Johnston with Johnston Motor Company and Lisa Fassler and Brian Barnard of Grocery outlet added to the already generous public donations to the Florence Food Share by donating an additional 150 pounds of peanut butter to help families and especially children over the summer months.  Families with children often take advantage of the opportunities through the Florence food share during summer months when kids are out of school.  Johnston says it is about community.

“The community is incredibly important to us and our business and to be able to help the community out and provide food for the food share is very important.”

Brian Johnston and Brian Barnard loading the Peanut Butter

In total about 600 pounds of Peanut butter has been delivered to the Florence Food Share.  The final weigh in will be today when Johnston Motor Company delivers the final jars of peanut butter.  Johnston Motor Company also provided a monetary donation to the Mapleton Food Share to help them with the purchase of peanut butter.

Clamming Closes South

On Friday the Oregon Department of Fish and wildlife closed Razor clamming along the coast from cape Blanco to the South Jetty of the Siuslaw.  Clamming remains open northward.  Saturday there were droves of people along the coast in Waldport at low tide ready to take advantage of the situation.  During this time of year the instances of demoic acid tends to increase and it is quite possible that clamming along the central and northern coast will begin to close as the water gets warmer.  ODFW takes samples every two weeks to insure the clams, crabs and other shellfish are safe to eat.

Siuslaw Watershed Receives Award

The Siuslaw Watershed council learned last week that they will be recipients of the Riparian Challenge Award from the Western Division of the American Fisheries Society for their work on the Fivemile-Bell Watershed Restoration Project that they have been working on just south of Florence.  The decade long restoration project covers approximately 5000 acres of national forest land as well as streams and waterways.  The project is intended to improve the population of the Oregon Coast Coho Salmon as well as other aquatic and terrestrial animals.