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Firstly, it is very hard for 0.25ppm (total) ammonia to be too high. In most cases, 0.25ppm is perfectly fine. It’s only when pH and/or temperature is really high that it is an issue. Secondly, it is very common for the API test (Imma wager you are using that) to register 0.25ppm ammonia when...

Ammonia produced could be immediately consumed, specifically by heterotrophs as a nitrogen source, which can occur very quickly even with lower starting numbers of cells. This would not produce nitrite, which would only occur if ammonia is consumed as an energy source. Nitrogenous compounds may...

I am not assuming anything. They said they only added a tiny bit everyday.

Assuming they have been ghostfeeding a proper amount of food consistently, yes that is correct. But they have not, so they should not be thinking that their cycle is done. Nitrate does not necessarily show up. Like I said, and I quote:

You need to add as much and as often as you intend to feed a fully stocked tank - i.e. ghostfeeding. But even then, no ammonia/nitrite/nitrate necessarily shows up. This is a common misconception in the hobby. All you are looking for when cycling by ghostfeeding is that ammonia and nitrite can...

Keep on ghostfeeding, until both ammonia and nitrite can read zero consistently for ten or so days.

You can just leave it be. Nitrifiers are very resilient and go for weeks to months starved of ammonia before even going dormant, let alone die off. So seven days is perfectly fine. In fact, probably would be a good thing. Gives your nitrite-oxidizers a chance to catch up and consume the nitrite...

From personal experience, yes. Probably takes even less time than that, but 30 minutes is a relatively safe bet.

Yep, bacteria (specifically nitrifiers, the 'beneficial bacteria' we try to cultivate) are super resilient and go for weeks to months starved of ammonia before going dormant, let alone die off. This is something actually found out by scientists themselves, so yeah. Yep, also true. And that is...

A lot of people do this successfully. I have lived in a lot of places, and two of those places, there were in fact enough chlorine/chloramine to kill the fish (and indeed did kill the fish), despite just a short period. So nowadays I don't ever do it and just accept the pain of treating the...

You are correct. I am a microbiologist. The problem isn't the 'type' of ammonia. I have certainly used ammonium chloride and no fish food, and have established robust populations of nitrifiers using all manners of different sources of the microorganisms. From bottled bacteria products to more...

Just dump the whole thing in, regardless of the instructions.

Gotcha. That's a bottled bacteria product, it helps to seed the tank with nitrifiers that will colonize your biomedia (and other surfaces).

There is no such thing as liquid bio media, at least when it comes to aquarium-keeping. What specific product are you referring to?

There are arguments for both ways, and is also dependent on how you define cycling. If the goal is to establish nitrifiers, then the answer is straight forward - add plants after. Plants also consume ammonia, therefore competing with nitrifiers and inhibiting the cycle. If the goal is to just...

Weeks to months before they go dormant significantly, and much longer before they materially die off.

Fishless cycling by ammonia-dosing is objectively the best method for cycling. It is in fact the only method that comes close to being able to guarantee establishment of nitrifiers, the purpose of cycling.

Yeah, looks like a red devil cichlid. Though many are known to be hybrids of red devils and midas cichlids, so individuals of unknown pedigree are more often referred to as a midevil.

Alrighty, let me chime in from a microbiologist's perspective. Simply put, nitrifiers are very resilient, and there is no expectation that they can't easily survive in a bottle for long durations. And I mean long. They go for weeks to months starved of ammonia before even really going dormant...

I think feeder fish is fine, to each their own.