I like to watch everyone's collective input just to see how the tide of cycle stop date calling is evolving in the hobby. My input is this: when ammonia drops in a cycle, it rapidly falls to safe levels relative to the surface area in a given system, which we all overdo. There isn't a display reef cycling anywhere on the internet that is low on surface area, we're all copying each other in ratio and that's why anytime someone adds fish to these cycles, the fish live.
Chemistry bros educated me on api test read issues: the reason cycled tanks tend to read .25 and not zero is because reef tanks don't run zero ammonia, they run a constant low level since ammonia production from respiring organisms doesn't stop 24x7
Api needs converted into nh3 per the directions before relaying to us as an ammonia level
Everyone skips that part and relays to us the nh4 reading, which is for freshwater
Reefs wants us to relay readings as nh3, which at .25= .02 ish
And on any ammonia chart, is. 02 lethal in reefing? Nope its healthy
That's why fish are always alive and fine right when the tests seem to indicate a stall
This cycle is done right now fritz carries fish the same day its added as mentioned above. Fritz handled the ammonia load in the first two hours. Where api is wrong compared to digital tests is api takes days in lag time to show the drop a digital meter shows in two hours.
