It's vital that you light your marine aquarium correctly; mostly standard aquarium lighting will be adequate but if you want to keep coral reefs or if you have a particularly deep tank, you should consider specialist lighting.
As always, colour temperature is what you're looking for and, for reefs, full spectrum lighting is essential. To achieve this full spectrum, you are looking for a Kelvin rating of 10,000K or higher on metal halide lamps. If you are going with fluorescent, your tubes should be marked as VHO, which simply stands for very high output. To be honest, with corals and deep tanks, metal halide lamps should be your first choice; the Kelvin range is wider and the quality of the light is higher than with other types of lamp. Not only will this enhance the overall colour of your tank lighting, but will also greatly enhance the colour of the plants, corals, fish and anenomes in your tank, which is after all, the effect we're after.
Something else to consider is the addition of an actinic bulb. This type of bulb emits a blue tinged light in the exact spectrum that corals require for photosynthesis. Beware though, the spectrum range of actinic lamps is very narrow and they should never be used in isolation. A wonderful side effect is the way these bulbs enhance the colours of your fish.
Who would have thought that lighting could be so complex? The truth is that lighting is a specialist subject and aquarium lighting is specialist lighting!
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