Iāve got a Superfish Home 45, the light is 12w LED blue and/or white, I have it on for about 10 hours a day. The tank is shaded by a wardrobe, itās not in direct sunlight.
I add the aqua care bio boost and tap water conditioner after every water change.
Iāve just cut back the middle plant as that seemed to have the most algae and did a 25% water change as it was due (hence the slightly foggy water), I do this every 2 weeks. The tank includes 9 endlers, about 6 shrimp and some snails.
OK, I can certainly offer a couple of suggestions that will improve things. First on the light as this is usually "the" crux of algae problems (note I said usually, not always). I'd want to pin down the spectrum. "White" light is made up of colour wavelengths--shine white light through a prism, or look as a rainbow; both will show you the colours that make up that white light. Changing the colour wavelengths, as can be done with manufactured light sources like bulbs, tubes and LED diodes, creates a different "white" light. Aquatic plants need red (primarily) and blue light to drive photosynthesis; adding green to these does improve the plants' response. We can assess this by either the Kelvin number or the CRI (colour rendering index) number. If you can find either of these numbers on the LED fixture, on the box, or online from the manufacturer's site, it will help a lot. Last comment on the colour, until we have the K or CRI, is be careful of the blue. Without the red, blue will cause algae because algae is not as fussy as the higher plants.
Duration is another factor, and here you might want to lessen it. My tank lighting is on 7 hours each day, and I worked down to this and have not seen black brush algae in six years now. This is the algae you have in the photo. Lower the duration to 8 hours and see how it goes over a few weeks. And by the way, the aim here is to stop the algae increasing; what is already there is not going to go away, but if we can get it stopped we can then deal with clean-up/removal.
Aqua Care Bio Boost. From what I see online, this is not going to benefit anything, and I would not use it. The plants are your best method of keeping the water in good shape. And this isnot a plant additive, it is something of a bacterial supplement. OK in a new tank with no plants, but not here.
Water changes need to be increased. At least once a week. And change more water at each, half the tank is fine. Provided the parameters--and these are GH, pH and temperature--are reasonably the same between tank water and tap water, you cannot do any harm changing water. This helps remove organics which feed algae.
The plants are not looking bad, but I would suggest two things. A comprehensive plant supplement, and some substantial floating plants. You are in the UK, London (assume this is UK) which has hard water, so no problem with that in this situation, but some of the micronutrients are likely missing especially with so few fish being fed. And being in the UK, a good product is The Nutrient Company's TNC Lite. The TNC Complete is the same but with nitrate and phosphorus, and you do not want to be adding those here. TNC Lite.
For floating plants, "substantial" ones like Water Sprite, Frogbit, and Water Lettuce are good. Tiny plants like duckweed would not provide the same benefits.
