NORTH BEND �¿�” Rain was falling as Ryan Stallings and Trevor Qualman scampered back down to Ash Street. A door closed softly behind them as they headed to the next house to ring its door bell.

The two 8-year-olds hefted white plastic bags straining under the weight of their contents.

Despite their onerous baggage and the wet weather, both boys were grinning from ear to ear, proud of their latest haul.

“They gave us a lot of food!” Ryan said.

Food? Yes. Not candy, food.

The morning after joining hundreds of Bay Area youth going door-to-door on their Halloween rounds, Ryan and Trevor were at it again. This time, they were among the dozens of Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts asking for canned goods and nonperishable food as part of the national Scouting for Food program.

“It’s for the poor,” said Nathan Monohon, a scoutmate of Trevor’s and Ryan’s in North Bend Pack 156.

“And the Salvation Army,” fellow Wolf Scout Matt Frischman piped in.

More specifically, it’s for the Salvation Army’s food cupboard.

All the food collected in Coos Bay and North Bend wound up at the Salvation Army office in Empire, where scouts and volunteers sorted, weighed and stacked it on pantry shelves.

The Boy Scouts have held the annual food drive the first weekend of November since 1988, and every year Coos County scouts have answered the call, said Jay Schaefer, local Boy Scout district executive.

“It’s a good thing for us to be able to help out,” Schaefer said as cans of chicken soup, beans, sloppy Joe mix and mandarin oranges were sorted on a table behind him at the Salvation Army. “It all stays in the local community.”

The food is sorely needed. The Salvation Army’s food cupboard was entirely empty last week, according to Maj. Cliff Jones.

“We are so thankful that the Scouts have their Scouting for Food day,” he said. “This food should last us ’til Christmas.”

The job isn’t always easy. The boys in Pack 156 were assigned houses in North Bend south of Ohio Avenue, which they canvassed for about two hours Saturday morning.

Most of the boys had collected food last year, but Danica Frischman gave her charges a refresher course on the do’s and don’ts before they headed off.

“Do we walk up on people’s lawns?” she asked.

“No,” the boys said in unison.

“Do we need to ring the door bell more than once?”

“No.”

“What do we say even if we don’t get anything?”

“Thank you!”

�¿�� As they headed off from the Oak Street Park, the Scouts got mixed results. Some door bells produced angry dogs, while others went unanswered. More often than not, though, the boys got what they were looking for.

“I got a giant can!” Trevor said after one stop.

“Look what they gave us,” said Ryan, showing off a couple boxes of macaroni and cheese, and cans of green beans.

Over at the Salvation Army, Jones said the food would be especially appreciated this year given a recent increase in demand.

“A lot of folks are new families,” he said. “They aren’t on our list of past clients.”

Schaefer said the Scouts in Coos Bay and North Bend collected about 1,200 pounds of food, while the countywide total reached about 4,400 pounds.