10 days in, still waiting for that ammonia spike?

[Rosegardener]

I started a new 20g 10 days ago and still waiting for that ammonia spike. What I have done was squeezed the filter foam from another established tank in this new tank, added 3-4 endler's guppy, a few of their frys couple of days after the foam squeeze. So the fishes has been in this tank for a week, no ammonia spike yet, nitrite and nitrate both zero. I haven't fed them during this duration, they have been very active and worked hard on scraping the driftwoods for algae.

Still too early or just these small fishes has been produce enough waste to trigger the cycling?

Any suggestions?

 

[Artur]

If you don't feed them, they don't produce that much waste - they still can eat that algae you mentioned but the most mess comes to a tank with pellets, flakes etc. Much of it ends up hanging around in the tank, not in fishes stomachs, then you have a lot of fish waste coming from that. Giving that you only have such a small number of very tiny fish there, they don't produce that much waste, you squeezed filter foam from established tank (which helps quite a lot - I also like to transport a little amount of biological media from "adult" tank).

Maybe you won't have an ammonia spike, maybe you will when you start feeding those guys.

And maybe your tests are not quite exact.

What kind of test do you have and use?

 

[AbbeysDad]

I've started tanks repeatedly by 'cleaning' sponges from an established tank in the new tank water. I never see an ammonia spike and you really shouldn't if/when there's enough beneficial bacteria to handle things. (see cycling a new aquarium). I can't explain why there's no nitrates (just wouldn't be the case in my fish world).
I would feed the fish lightly to ensure they do well and produce normal waste.
Good luck and keep posting.