Jim Stime and his Entertaining Reef Reality Television Videos !
Eddie Hansen visits the Reeffarmers booth at the 2008 BA-CFM event !
Reeffarmers - This web site is the main distribution site for captive farmed
corals from the farming business Reeffarmers (owned and operated by Steve Tyree).
Steve has been farming and distributing captive stony corals since 1993. Back then, the
captive maintainance of reef building stony corals was still considered impossible by many.
Today there are literally thousands of reef aquarist around the world that are not only
maintaining these corals but they are successfully farming them. Over the years Steve has
managed to acquire a large collection of rare and exotic corals. To this day Steve continues
to search the U.S. for captive corals that he considers rare and exotic. Reeffarmers main
product lines include: Limited Editions; Farmed Exotics; and Evaluation Corals. All of our
product lines are described below and their web sales pages are selectable in the menu on
the left.
Limited Editions - These corals form the main business within Reeffarmers.
Limited Edition (LE) corals are rare and exotic corals that Steve has collected over the
years and continues to collect to this very day. The demand for these corals has been
extremely high. Strong demand can actually cause problems for farmers. Over harvesting was
a consistant problem with early exotic coral farming enterprises. To better match distribution
(harvesting rates) with customer demand, Reeffarmers implemented a harvesting reservation
system. The rate of harvest was based on the growth rate of the farmed coral. We have however
decided in July of 2010 to discontinue the reservation process for new corals. This is
primarly a recognition of the current state of the US economy and it future short term
prospects. In these economic conditions, it is very difficult to have reservations that are
a few years into the future become realized as valid orders. This is because many people are
experiencing work and resident displacements and changes. We will keep records of the old
reservations on the corals LE web page. We will also continue to create LE web pages for
new LE corals. The only change is that we wont take reservations. Right now we intend to
release each First Edition LE through a silent controlled auction. That auction will be
conducted safely with no financial information being transferred though the internet. Each
auction bidder will have their bid and full name displayed so independent confirmation of
the actual auction process can be conducted. We intend to sell additional captive grown
fragments of the LE corals through either our Buy It Now page or through additional silent
auctions. Since we no longer have to setup reservations records for new corals, we will be
able to release new LE corals one at a time whenever they are ready.
We are not trademarking the use of the term 'Limited Edition' with respect to harvested coral
fragments. Reeffarmers was the first to use the term with respect to corals and we believe it
should now be considered a common usage term by the captive coral industry.
Auctioned Editions - Please note - We will be incorporating all of our old Auctioned
Edition corals into the Limited Edition product line. We do not like performing live auctions
any more due to bad experiences in the past. We will still do Silent Auctions run manually
from this web site for First Editions.
Evaluation Corals - These corals are currently being evaluated as possible new Limited
Edition corals. There is no guarantee that these will become LE corals. The current list price
for these LE Evaluations Corals is $40 per small fragment. Typically these corals have been
distributed via private sales and on some of Steve Tyree's previous road trips. We will however
be offering some of the corals for sale via this web site. The reason we are waiting to determine
if each coral will be an LE coral is listed under the image. If the coral does become an LE it
can be purchased now as an evaluation LE at the cheap $40 price. LE corals range in price from
$50 to $250 per fragment. If the coral is not made an LE it will still be sold at this $40 per
fragment exotic coral price. Customers interested in purchasing any of these corals should email
to Reeffarmers at reeffarmers@ispwest.com . Please note that if Reeffarmers acquires a coral
that we initially realize will definitly become an LE coral, it will not be offerred as an LE
Evaluation.
Farmed Exotics - These exotic corals are what Steve Tyree believes to be rare and unusual
corals that are not quite suitable for Limited Edition status due to various reasons.
The current list price for these Farmed Exotics ranges from $30 to $40 per small fragment.
Typically these corals are distributed through our web site, through private sales and through
Steve Tyree's road trips. Some of these corals may have been grown in Reeffarmers facility or
they may have been acquired from other coral farmers. Customers interested in purchasing any
of these corals should email Reeffarmers.
Farmed Corals - These corals are fairly common and many have been distributed into the
captive coral market for years. The current list price for these Farmed Corals ranges from $15 to
$30 per small fragment. Typically these corals are distributed through our web site and through
some of Steve Tyree's previous road trips. Some of these corals may have been grown in Reeffarmers
facility or they may have been acquired from other coral farmers. If you are new to Reef Building
Stony Corals (SPS) the corals noted as being Easy to Maintain are very good starter corals.
Customers interested in purchasing any of these corals should email Reeffarmers.
Farmed Sponge - Reeffarmers utilizes natural filtration systems based on Steve Tyree's
Zonal Filtration Methodologies. We currently do not have any protein skimmers on any of our 7
farming reef systems. These methods rely on crytpic sponges, sea squirts and bi-valves.
Steve Tyree harvests excess cryptic organisms growth and distributes these organisms via
Reeffarmers and his own Zonal Natural Filtration web site. We will be updating the Farmed Sponge
web page soon.
Old Farmer Membership System -
Reeffarmers.com was originally setup as a web database for reef farming individuals from around the
world. The costs of web hosting in recent years has dropped dramatically and this has enabled many
free and low cost alternatives to creating web pages about farming reef animals. This has meant that
our subscription service never did create a strong demand. We have not signed up any new farmers in
over a few years and we never charged any farmer for more then 1 year of listing fees. That farming
listing idea was developed by Steve Tyree and although it never became financially successful for
Steve, he hopes that it may have inspired other similar services to be developed. An example
of a successful reeffarmer listing service can be found at www.frags.org . We currently recommend
that service for anyone interested in a low cost easy to setup reef farmer listing service.
