About Reefphyto. Live Marine Nutrition from Wales, Est. 2008.

You have spent real money on equipment, real time on water chemistry, and real care on the animals in your tank. And at some point, you have probably watched a fish you love fade despite doing everything right.

The water was perfect. The parameters were stable. The equipment was dialled in. But the fish was pale, disinterested, or slowly declining. The corals were not extending. And nothing you tried seemed to close the gap.

Most of the time, the problem is not the water. It is the food.

Frozen and dried food was never designed for reef life. Marine fish evolved over millions of years eating live zooplankton. Copepods, phytoplankton, rotifers. The complex, nutrient-dense planktonic community of a real reef. Without it, even the most carefully maintained tank falls short.

Why Reefphyto Exists

We know what it feels like to watch a fish fade despite doing everything right. Darren, Reefphyto's founder, spent years watching the UK reef-keeping community struggle with the same nutritional gap. Dedicated keepers doing everything they could, losing animals they cared about, and blaming themselves for something that was never about water chemistry.

The science was clear. The solution was straightforward. But there was no practical, reliable source of professionally cultured live marine food available to UK hobbyists.

Darren had the facility. He had the expertise. He had spent years culturing live marine foods at professional scale. And he was tired of watching good keepers fail at nutrition when the answer was sitting in his culture vessels.

Reefphyto was founded in Wales in 2008 to close that gap. Eighteen years later, it is still the only thing we do.

What We Do

Everything Reefphyto produces is cultured live at our specialist facility in Wales. Copepods, phytoplankton, rotifers, zooplankton blends. All maintained under controlled aquaculture conditions. All dispatched fresh on the day of preparation. All shipped with viability as the primary concern.

We do not source from third parties. We do not hold stock. Every order is prepared from active, living cultures that Darren and the team maintain continuously. What arrives at your door is the same product we use in our own professional aquaculture work, not a diluted, aged, or processed version of it.

That matters because live food is only as good as its cell density, activity, and nutritional content at the point it reaches your tank. A copepod that has been sitting in a warehouse for days is not the same as one dispatched that morning. A phytoplankton product stored for months is not the same as one cultured and shipped fresh. We have built everything about how we operate around delivering genuine, living nutrition, not a compromise version of it.

Darren. The Expertise Behind Every Order.

Darren has been culturing live marine foods professionally since 2008. He did not start Reefphyto because he spotted a gap in the market. He started it because he had already spent years solving the problem and was frustrated that nobody else was making the solution available to hobbyists.

That expertise is part of what you receive when you order from Reefphyto. Darren monitors every question that comes through the site and answers personally where he can. If you are not sure which product is right for your tank, or you are having trouble getting results and want a second opinion, he is genuinely available. Not a support ticket. Not a script. Darren.

If you want personal guidance on your specific setup, reach out. Reef keeping is a hobby built on shared knowledge, and that has always been how Reefphyto operates.

Who We Supply

Reefphyto supplies reef keepers, marine fish breeders, and public aquariums across the UK. From first-time mandarin dragonet keepers establishing a refugium copepod population, to professional aquariums running continuous zooplankton programmes, the range is designed to serve every level of serious marine husbandry.

The hobbyist and the professional have the same fundamental need: live food that is genuinely alive, genuinely nutritious, and genuinely reliable. That is what we provide, at every scale.

Our Commitment

Every culture we dispatch is prepared to the same standard regardless of order size. A 100ml Reef Shot pouch receives the same care as a 5,000ml phytoplankton order. If something is not right when your order arrives, we make it right. That is a straightforward commitment and one we have maintained since 2008.

We are not the cheapest option available. Live food cultured properly, dispatched fresh, and shipped with viability in mind costs more than a bottle of preserved or diluted product. We believe the difference in what your tank receives is worth that. Our customers tend to agree once they see the results.

If your reef fish are surviving but not thriving on frozen and dried food, switching to live food is the right decision.