This marine biologist, coastal forager and seaweed farmer is making waves on the Oregon Coast.
On most days you can find Alanna Kieffer by the Pacific Ocean. She might be farming Pacific dulse for Oregon Seaweed or sharing her love of marine ecosystems with others through her business Shifting Tides, which connects people and place through educational adventures in Oregon’s intertidal zones. Or she might be planning special dining events for a multivenue series she co-founded, Winter Waters, which focuses on regenerative seafood. Regardless of where she is, however, one thing’s certain: She’s raising awareness about the habitats of the Oregon Coast.
Promoting Oregon’s Seaweed Revolution
When Kieffer first started working with the Haystack Rock Awareness Program as a volunteer, she knew she had found her calling in marine sciences. What was more unexpected was her path to seaweed farming for a new company called Oregon Seaweed. She quickly discovered the deep connections between growing Pacific dulse for the largest land-based seaweed farm in the country and her passion for coastal education.
“Through both I get to raise awareness about the importance of sea plants,” she says. Though Oregon Seaweed has two farms, Kieffer is most often at the Port of Garibaldi location, managing a grid of twenty 1,500-gallon waterfront tanks. Each bubbling vat stores up to 400 pounds of cultivated red dulse, one of the fastest-growing protein sources on the planet. When giving tours of the farm, she often refers to it as a miracle plant. “All it needs is fresh seawater and sunshine to thrive.”
“We’ve definitely seen a growing interest in seaweed for environmental reasons and people wanting to eat healthier,” she says. “It’s fun to make special dishes with seaweed, but I throw it into any stir-fry just like kale.” You can find Oregon dulse on the menu at many coastal restaurants — including in daily specials at The Knot Bar in Astoria, in savory chowders at Nehalem’s Buttercup and on the Central Coast at Newport’s Local Ocean — or fresh and dried at markets.
Seeing Magic in Oregon’s Shifting Tides
When Kieffer is not sampling seaweed, she’s conducting guided explorations of the Coast’s intertidal zones. “Exploring at low tide and seeing an entire ocean ecosystem that’s normally covered in water is amazing,” she says. “It’s like scuba diving on land.”
Kieffer offers a wide variety of workshops throughout the year through her business Shifting Tides, which often involve creative pop-ups with other organizations. She recently led a botanical cyanotype workshop for the annual Stormy Weather Arts Festival in Cannon Beach, for example.
But the meat — or rather seafood — and potatoes of the business is a full calendar of coastal-foraging and intertidal-exploration workshops held during the spring and summer months. The interactive excursions include tide-pooling, seaweed identification, mussel foraging and bay clamming. For seafood enthusiasts, her shellfish adventures often include a cooking demo and snacks on the beach.
As students gather and nibble, Kieffer sheds light on some of the magic of coastal habitats, from its rugged terrain to the cold, nutrient-dense waters that support an incredible array of life. “The Pacific Northwest has some of the most diverse and abundant intertidal ecosystems in the world,” she says.
Celebrating Winter Waters
A steadfast sustainable-seafood advocate, Kieffer teamed up with two other coastal educators — commercial fisher and food-systems changemaker Kristen Penner and seafood marketing specialist Rachelle Hacmac — to create Winter Waters, an annual culinary extravaganza, held every February. In 2025, its third season promises to provide even more amazing meals.
At various dinners and events throughout the month, the trio partners with chefs and tastemakers from Portland to the Oregon Coast to create dishes using regenerative seafood, with an emphasis on farmed sea vegetables and sustainably caught Oregon seafood. Standout experiences in the past two years have ranged from sea-to-table dinners in Gearhart, Astoria and Portland to a cozy Japanese-themed seaweed dinner and ramen night at Basalt Studio in Cannon Beach.
To preview Shifting Tides workshops, learn more about events or just observe some of the creatures Kieffer encounters on a daily basis, head over to her Instagram. There you’ll find nudibranchs (tiny sea slugs with frilly gills in flamboyant hues), a giant Pacific octopus, a rare stalked jellyfish with little pom-pom arms — or perhaps a beautiful frosty cocktail featuring a feathery frond of dulse.
– By Kerry Newberry
Top photo: Travis Thompson / Elevation 0M