Garf.org.. anyone know about them?

[braydenspoppa]

I had someone locally tell me about this site so I checked it out. This stuff seems awesome!! They are totally about conservation and responsible reefkeeping.

Has anyone had any experience with their aquaculturing?

Oh yea.....

I PICKED UP MY 75 GALLON TODAY!!! W00T!!

[TippyToeX]

I don't have any personal experience with Garf, so I can't help you there. What I can do for you while you wait for a good response is to give you the results of a search using "Garf.org" here

Congrats on the new tank!


HTH

[Mouse]

There are many diff opions on GARF here, from exelent to fraud. do a search and you will see

[dragon_slayer]

they go on and on about being a "non profit" place, but witht he amount of items they sell and the prices they charge, i find it a little hard to belive they arent enjoying a lot of leasure time in the name of research. even on some of their personal pages they go on and on abou 'my new tank i just got, i dont know where ill put it with my 200 others...........'

but if they got what you want, and its at a reasonable price, get it.

nuff said
kc

[GARFVolunteer]

I have dealt with GARF for nearly five years and was so impressed with them, that I was a GARF volunteer until this spring. Most of the corals that I have had in my tank since I set it up have come from GARF. My tank is setup following GARF's "Bullet Proof Reef" method. I frag my corals using GARF's methods. I have built tanks, sumps, stands, and plenums using GARF's methods and then volunteered to create the DIY section of their site to make it easier for others.

Over the last couple of years there have been times I did stuff to my tank that GARF warned me against. Most of the time I have ended up regretted it. One bonehead stunt I pulled caused terrible outbreak of cynobacteria that was smothering many of my acroporas and they started RTNing. I was home from Texas for the weekend and took the stressed corals over to GARF on a Saturday. Leroy showed me on the microscope the little critters that was causing the RTNing, and then proceeded to treat the corals using 3 different methods. After each treatment he showed me the effectiveness of the treatment using the microscope. It was all kind of neat... I left the corals at GARF for them to finish fragging with the understanding I would be able to get one frag from each colony back once I fixed the root cause of the bacteria.

I personally think GARF is great. Sure there could be improvements but overall I don't this you will find too many places as helpful or knowledgeable. Someday I hope to find the time to volunteer once again because I think the the effort is worth while.

Thanks,

Scott

[Bono]

When I got into reefing a few years ago, I too was very excited to learn of GARF until I ordered from them. The frags are very small and the grunge was a wast of money IMO. For what you pay, the grunge is a bunch of rubble without much life to it. Your better off getting a cup or two of sand from different reefers in your area who will usually give it to you for free. Also, for a non profit, their prices are pretty expense, although I haven't been on there site for a few years.

I would do a search on GARF and on Aquacon and then decide for yourself.

[Imaexpat2]

Yes I agree they can be a bit on the pricey side of things when you order indvidual corals and the frags are small. But when buy their 10 frags for 100.00 why would you not expect their frags to be small.

I will say that their staff is incredibly helpful and very professional(SP?). I have gotten some devestatingly drop dead goregous corals from them. They have all arrived very well packed, very healthy and seem to be very robust growing in my tank. On a number of occasions I have had them send extras with my packages.

I have also contacted them and gotten assistance over the phone with problems I am having in my tank. Try that with your average online seller.

I will continue to use their facility for corals and several other items without reservations. JMHO.....

[Joe_Bui]

There are some many different ways you can set up a reef tank. I set my first tank up over 7 years ago thru trial and error. The tank is now very stable, but has room for improvements. When I decided to set up another reef tank, I decided that I wanted to follow a recipe per say for a reef tank. I did a lot of research on the web and found that I gravitated back to GARF. Their methods made sense, and I lliked their philosophy on zero impact reef tanks.

The new tank has been up and running for a few months now. It has been much more stable, with a lot less problems than my other tank. What was the difference? I believe that it was a combination of the use a plenum, dosing with Seachem products based on Garf's schedule, and the their grunge.

As I said, there are lots of ways to have a successful reef tank. GARF's system seems to be working great for me. I would recommend it to anyone setting up a reef tank.

[Diatom2]

braydenspoppa~

The longer I am around this hobby, the more I'm convienced that there are multiple ways to set up a successful tank. From Berlin to dsb/plenum, all the way up to every conceivible peice of hardware imaginable.

Many people seem pleased with GARFs methods. I think most people that have problems with them seem to be more in the way that they run their organization rahter then the ideas that the represent.

Hope the new tank goes well for you. Always nice to see another NDaker on the boards.

[Imaexpat2]

I am with you on that one Joe Bui! I would be quick to recommend a tank be set up per their Bullet Proof Reef Tank recipe. Its hard to argue with their success! They have some truely astounding tanks. What has amazed me is the fact that they have managed to do it using NO & VHO lighting. I was absolutely hammered with the idea that SPS's were impossible without Halides. While I think Halides are better, they are by no means required, obviously.

Diatom2, I echo a lot of the things you said. There are a lot of ways to have a nice tank, very few ways to have a bad one.

Good to hear your thoughts (right, wrong or indifferent) on this, fellas.