"Obviously it was started by myself many moons ago when I was first getting into keeping marines. Before I made the leap of setting up a tank I turned to the internet for info, in those days there weren't any marine focused bulletin boards in the UK. I had been frequenting the odd tropical fish board (I originally kept a few community trops after inheriting my mate's tank which is what got me into fish keeping in the first place) and joined a couple of E-mail lists for marines in the UK. However I much preferred the nature of the bulletin board, so spent most of my time on the US boards Reef Central, Reefs.org etc. I managed to locate a few other UK based reefers hanging round on those BB's at the time and they sort of became reef keeping internet buddies I guess.

After a while I got frustrated with the US biased discussion, they had access to much cheaper (and better) stock and they could buy equipment we could only dream off. Remember back then 'Seaclones' were about the best skimmers you could buy for sensible money!

I decided we could do with our own community in the UK, to allow us to discuss the hobby with a UK slant on things. Not knowing much about hosting and bulletin boards (or in fact websites), I managed to cobble together a basic site and signed up for a free bulletin board service based on ezboard. "Doh's Reef Tank" was born, the remnants for which can still be seen - Doh's Reef Tank. Unfortunately I don't have the necessary access to the site anymore so I guess it will forever be a shine to the birth of UR. Anyway after some err blatant recruiting I managed to get a membership base and things seemed to go well. The board grew and a proper little community developed.

Sadly the popularity of ezboard started to grow too, they took advantage of this (who can blame then) by plastering the bulletin boards they provided with adverts and imposing ever more restrictions. Due to this I started to form a plan to create something on my own, much more professional looking, after some late night IRC chats with fellow reefers LPSman (Marc) and EnglishReefer (Simon) the name UltimateReef.com was chosen.

The new site and bulletin board finally went live on the 18th April 2001 and has over the last 7 years grown into the UR we all now know.

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank the original members, all of the team (both past and present) and all of the sponsors that have come and gone for making UR what it is today "The UK's premier online reef keeping community" you should all be very proud, I know I am. Of course it wouldn't be the place it is without the current members and I thank you for your support and hope you'll continue to enjoy it for many years."

Hi everyone, well I've been ordered by the rest of the team to put pen to paper, well fingers to keys, for the first team profile in the brand new UR newsletter.

First off the basics, my name is Pete Doyle, I'm 30 years young and I live in Leicester. I am happily married to Lisa and have no children (other than my cars according to the wife!). I work for an I.T. company as a Technical Consultant - it's really rather dull, I'd much prefer to have been a racing driver of some sort

Sadly I don't get much time to spend in the reefing world as I would like. I do still have a tank, a 6x2x2.5 ft, I setup a couple of years ago, though it hasn't been terribly successful! I used to be able to do reef tanks in my sleep, my old 6 footer outgrew itself, for some reason this one is proving a challenge, it's certainly no TOTM material. Hopefully I'll be able to have a rethink and bring it somewhere close to those standards in the future.

Anyway that's all from me - happy reefing everyone!

Pete

As a new sponsor I would like to thank UltimateReef for giving us this space in the newsletter.

First Stop Aquatics is a mail order company based in Northampton and run by me and my partner Rachel. We have been trading for just over three years and are expanding year on year. Our aim is to keep the site user friendly to allow customers to find exactly what they are looking for quickly and at the best prices. With a great selection of goods for all your reefing needs why not log on and take a look?

Many Thanks to all our customers for the ongoing support

Lee & Rachel
www.firststopaquatics.co.uk
sales@firststopaquatics.co.uk

"If a hobbyist is ever looking for that special piece or unusual fish then please contact us, we will always endeavour to locate the animal for you provided it isn't on any excluded listing.

The Interruptus Angel is truly stunning and a big fish, we believe this is the only one to come in to the UK this year and that it's unlikely another will be available during 2008. Luckily for all on UR a very lucky member has purchased this beauty so we will all get to see lots of pictures."