Full fishless cycle or not

[Lynnzer]

My new tank is set up now. As per here
I have today received my new external canister filter with UV light built in. In the meantime, and only for the last day, I have put a large sponge bubble filter into the tank, along with a smaller mini internal filter. Both of them had previously been in use for some time in other tanks alongside other filters.
As these will have beneficial bacteria in them, albeit perhaps not a high population being secondary filters, Will I still have to do a full fishless cycle?
The LFS says that by the addition of the soil, I will inevitably get high ammonia levels initially and that I should do a water change each day until I start to see some nitrate indications. However, I didn't know at the time, that I was going to add used filters from other tanks. They also said that my ph levels would decrease due to the soil.
I tested the water this morning before the new canister filter was installed and I showed a level of 1.0 ammonia, a very marginal pink on the nitrite and nothing on the nitrate. Tested just the last half hour ago and the ammonia is still about the same and I'm getting about 0.25 nitrite, and 2.5 nitrate. I guess this shows basically that things are starting to happen. Or not?
Oh, I also put a dose of API Quickstart in mid times of the readings.
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Just thought. OUCH.....
Given that I need ammonia for the first stage, ie feeding the bacteria to produce nitrite, should I really be changing the water? It seems to me that it's like denial of food to the bacteria.

 

[Essjay]

I have read that some brands of soil leach ammonia for up to 6 months, so fish can't be added till it's stopped. But the ammonia will feed the plants so if they have everything else they need they should be well grown by the time the tank is ready for fish..
It will depend on how much ammonia from the soil and for how long. Does google have comments from other users about low long your brand leaches ammonia?

Since the tank is planted, you could always do a plant cycle - wait until the plants have shown obvious signs of growth, then once ammonia drops to zero and assuming there's no nitrite, add fish a species at a time.

 

[Lynnzer]

I think I may be nearing completion of the cycle.
I have made 3 partial water changes over the period ranging from 30% to 75% of volume.These were made as the ammonia levels were getting rather high. Over that time, the nitrite and nitrate level has fluctuated up to levels that still showed as not overly high but high enough to warrant a water change.
My last water change of 75% was due to ammonia getting above the 3% with the nitrates at 30-40 ppm. The nitrites had a similar level in colour codes on the API test kit.
After that change yesterday, I did another test a couple of hours later that showed reduced levels all around. In fact the ammonia was showing at more or less clear.
This morning the test shows ammonia at 5.0, nitrite at 0.25 and nitrate at zero.
So it seems that the nitrate is fine but what about the ammonia and nitrite?
Is this just a case of another water change, or maybe just letting things go for now to calm down by itself?

I added more quick start bacteria yesterday following the water change that may have had some impact.

 

[Lynnzer]

Great.
Cycle completed. The tests are just perfect.
The tank has shown a couple of things that I needed to think about such as a large biofilm growth and some minor fungal blooms on a piece of wood.
Also I keep finding the occasional very small bladder snail.
My next action is to do a 3 day course of snail elimination before I introduce fish and shrimp.
Then I will be averaging the water parameters to the needs of the fish I'm thinking of putting in there. That'll mean mixing either tapwater with rainwater or Asda/Tesco bottled. I have the mix already worked out although the last few tests on my tapwater shows big differences in the GH levels.