Newbie Tank Cycle Question

[zbb]

So we set up and started running the pump on a Flex15 seven days ago, followed by a trip down to the Aquarium Co-op store to get the rest of our supplies. So far, we've added: 

• A hair shy of two bags of active flora substrate
• Pogostemon (octopus plant)
• Water lettuce
• Moneywart
• One other dark green grass plant as a grab bag whose name I can't recall
• A handful of water lettuces
• 16oz of Fritzyme (over the last week)
• 30 drops of Fritz water conditioned/dechlorifier 
• 15 gals of tap water with no chlorine, 6.8 pH and low KH buffer (around 40ppm) 

On Monday and then again on Tuesday we added a half cube (so around 5g) of frozen cyclops fish food, and we're testing water every day. We're also testing water every day, and I'm getting the following numbers yesterday (24 hrs after first 5g of cyclops) and today (48 hrs after first 5g cyclops, 48 hrs after second 5g of cyclops): 

• Ammonia: 0 ppm
• Nitrite: 0 ppm
• Nitrate: 0 ppm
• Hardness (GH): 75 ppm
• Buffer (KH): between 40 and 60 ppm
• pH: 6.8
• Chlorine: 0 ppm
• Water temp: 70°F

My question is whether this seems right and on track to be considered "cycled," or if it should take more time for the 5g cyclops/day to actual convert to ammonia to see if the cycle is in fact started. I also think that running at 70° shouldn't be a problem for establishing the nitrogen cycle, but maybe we need to hold off to confirm until we get a heater? 

Our four year old is super excited to get some fish, but we don't want to rush them into a stressful environment. 

[Zzsharks]

You should use some friz zyem 7 to jump start the Ammonia.But make sure that there is Ammonia before you put in your fish.

[zbb]

On 10/12/2022 at 3:17 PM, Zzsharks said:

You should use some friz zyem 7 to jump start the Ammonia.But make sure that there is Ammonia before you put in your fish.

I used two 8oz bottle over the past week (6 oz up front, and then 2oz every other day or so after that). Will the cyclops food generate ammonia? What weirds me out is that I haven't detected any yet (nor Nitrites or Nitrates). 

[AllFishNoBrakes]

The cyclops will need to decay and rot to produce ammonia. Then your cycle will start. With the bottled fritz bacteria you should push through the cycle pretty quickly once the cyclops decay to produce ammonia. 
 

How long will the cyclops take to decay? I don’t have that answer. 

Edited October 12, 2022 by AllFishNoBrakes
Typo

[Miranda Marie]

To me it sounds like the food hasn't decomposed enough yet to start the cycle. I'd add in something that produces Ammonia faster and then take a reading and see what that says, or keep adding what you are for a few more days and see if you get a spike. (I think fish flakes etc should break down fairly quickly if you want to go that route?)

[Anjum]

When the food decays enough to produce ammonia, the plants you added will initially eat up the ammonia/nitrites/nitrates before it has a chance to register on your tests. But the plants also probably brought some beneficial bacteria to help start the cycle. I'd keep doing what you're doing (or use something cheaper to ghost feed if you like) until you start to see something on your tests. Even my heavily planted tanks will usually register a small amount of nitrate. Your cycle isn't finished until you're getting a nitrate reading. You may see no ammonia, but be getting a nitrite reading because those bacteria take longer to proliferate. Nitrite is still detrimental to fish. 

This video helped me understand it all

 

[zbb]

Thanks, super helpful. I hadn't seen this one yet. 

[zbb]

Happy to inform that we've been through an ammonia spike that's converted to nitrite and then nitrate and now all are absent. And we have substantial plant growth from the val and octopus plant. Added a mystery snail a few days ago, and we're probably on our way to get a trio of endlers and maybe also a couple of cherry shrimp this afternoon.

Thanks all for the help. For anyone interested in a little data, here are a couple of charts from the past two weeks. Did two 25% water changes, and some days have two tests. 

 

[zbb]

Update: skipped the cherry shrimp because pH was a little low, so we went with three endlers and some crushed coral. Shrimp coming soon, hopefully!

[PineSong]

Endlers are a great choice and they will enjoy that planted tank!