The specific start allowance measure for you is this: take your ammonia tester and liquid ammonium chloride add to the water to about 1 ppm, a typical level cheap testers can work with. Take note of what your tester looks like before you dose ammonia, a calibration test. Take note of the slight change in color as you go to 1 ppm
check in 24 hours, if the ammonia has moved down discernibly then change the qt tank water and start. You don’t have to get to zero on the test kit, most wont show zero accurately, it only has to discernibly move down in 24 hours.
if it can move ammonia down you have confirmed surface area and bac requirements. In qt tanks it’s possible to have too little surface area while having very live bac. If the ammonia holds the same it likely means the surface area isn’t sufficient (add more sponge material etc) as true dead bottle bac doesn’t hardly happen.
