u/suckadickandfuckoff

I’m cycling a heavily planted 39L freshwater tank and I’m a bit puzzled by what’s happening.

Tank:
- WIO 60-F Shallow (39L)
- Oase Filtosmart 60
- 50W heater at 24°C
- Twinstar 600E IV running 6 hours/day at 40%
- Dark sand over mesh bags of aquasoil
- Heavily planted (11 Tropica 1-2 Grow pots + Peace Lily) - these look very healthy and are growing well
- Redmoor wood and Seiryu stone

I’ve been fishless cycling with Dr Tim’s Ammonium Chloride since 19th June, testing almost every day with the API Master Test Kit.

Timeline:
- Started by dosing to ~1.5-2 ppm ammonia.
Had a bacterial bloom within the first couple of days which lasted about a week and has now totally cleared
- Biofilm developed on the wood
- Ammonia initially disappeared very quickly over 24 hours, which I assumed was mostly the plants
- Since then, ammonia processing slowed down
- On 2nd July I dosed 35 ml of Tetra SafeStart directly into the filter to try get the nitrifying bacteria to get going and dosed ammonium chloride to 2ppm
- Current readings over the last three days are roughly:
3 July: Ammonia ~1.5 ppm
4 July: Ammonia ~0.75 ppm
5 July: Ammonia ~0.5 ppm

Throughout the entire cycle I have never once measured:
- Nitrite above 0 ppm
- Nitrate above 0 ppm

I’ve confirmed the nitrate test procedure multiple times (shaking the bottles and tube very thoroughly etc.).

Water parameters:
- pH around 7.2-7.4
- KH ~4 dKH
- GH ~6 dGH
- Temperature 24°C

My questions are:
- Has anyone seen a planted tank cycle like this where nitrite and nitrate never become detectable?
- Could the plants realistically be taking up enough ammonium that I’m barely seeing nitrification?
- Could the bacteria simply still be establishing in the filter despite 16 days passing?
- Is there anything obvious I’m overlooking?
- If I allow ammonia to drop to 0, could I add some cherry shrimp safely in about a week?

I’m mainly trying to work out whether this is just an unusually plant-heavy cycle that needs more time, or whether something genuinely isn’t right. Any opinions or similar experiences would be appreciated.

Hi all, first post in here!

I set up my aquarium yesterday. It’s a WIO Shallow 60, with lots of plants, Seiryu stone and Redmoor wood. My filter, as the title says, is an Oase FiltoSmart 60 with the inlet pictured

Ignore the milky the water, pretty sure it’s just a bacterial bloom since I added Dr Tim’s Ammonium Chloride solution for a fishless cycle.

My plan is to add a Neocaridina shrimp colony in about a month, assuming the water tests properly cycled and stable.

I’m wondering should I add a pre-filter sponge to the inlet?It looks like it could have sponge or filter floss put inside it.

I’ve done a lot research online but I’m new to all this, so any advice or recommendations are much appreciated.

Thanks in advance!