Tank cycled or false negatives?
Hello all! This is my first tank/paludarium build. Started the process of cycling about a week and a half ago. I added snails (a few Ramshorn and bladder snails) over this past weekend, as well. I also did the frozen shrimp thing to help the cycling process along. Took it out when the ammonia was around 2ppm. Added some crushed coral a few days ago for a falling ph.
So the problem: I’ve been testing the past few days, and routinely have been coming up with 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, AND 0 nitrate. I’ve never seen the nitrite or nitrate test at anything but zero (I got the test kits for nitrite and nitrate on Friday, ammonia I’ve had since a week ago), but as mentioned I HAVE seen the ammonia spike.
I decided to just go and buy some pure ammonia from ace to get a more reliable view of things. I added in 4 drops about 5 hours ago (~2.5gallons of water in a 20gal long), I go to test, and sure enough… 0 for all the tests.
KH came out at 0 too, gh went from 5 to 7 after the coral. Ph low 7s.
the question: is my tank cycled? Is it due to the plants? Am I getting false negatives or what? I find it really hard to believe this tank cycled in a week and a half 😭
Edit: some readability stuff