Relatively new to sailing, when I bought my second boat - a serious cruiser - it came with an anchor buoy - a round float and about 40ft of rope. I decided to use it from time to time - thinking that it would be neat to know where the anchor is, it might prevent people anchoring in exactly the same spot and if I fouled the anchor, it gives me a tripping line to retrieve the anchor with. I have never been religious in using it however - probably less than 20% of the time...

Recently on various websites I 've been reading about people being fed up with boats that deploy anchor buoys. I 'm not exactly sure of the reasons why - maybe someone here can enlighten me.

HOWEVER: I 've been off on a trip the last couple of weeks, travelling in tandem with friends on another boat. We came to anchor in Port Jefferson on Long Island, NY and anchored sensibly close together for sociability - not so close as to represent a threat. In the afternoon, a squall passed through and I watched with horror as my friend 's boat sailed around her anchor, with our anchor buoy passing between the stern of their boat and their dingy. Any closer and the buoy could have been collected by their rudder - and simply tripped our anchor as they continued to sail around theirs.

We remained lucky - but as soon as the squall passed, we upped anchor and removed the offending buoy.

Safe to say, I don 't think I 'll be using the anchor buoy again anytime soon - unless alone in a fouled anchorage perhaps...

Bill Balme

Hi Bill,

Anchor buoys and trip lines remain controversial. Some people say they take up too much space in an anchorage. It may depend on the size of the anchorage and how close boats need to be to one another, what the potential is for someone to drop anchor on top of yours especially if you have a lot of rode out, and how likely the anchor is to foul in the given bottom. In a place like Port Jeff where there is oodles of room and a soft bottom, you are less likely to need one.

Most people complain about trip lines in tight anchorages. They like to have their swing radius overlap significantly to allow more scope which they cannot do if you have an anchor buoy out. We like to prevent people from overlapping that much if possible since every boat swings a bit differently. We don 't like to play bumper boats in the night if there is a wind or current shift.

Your example is one that must be seriously considered. Any time you add gear you add potential complications. Our friends sailing in the Caribbean had their trip line pulled up and their boat set adrift in the middle of the night as one of the locals thought someone had set down a competing mooring. We watched a boat pull up to our buoy and try to pick it up thinking it was a mooring. It 's a risk.

Losing an anchor is an expensive proposition for us. As we have had one anchor so jammed that we 've had to cut it away, we tend to use trip lines rather often. We use nylon rope so it sinks and doesn 't foul dinghy props. We label our buoy with our boat name so it 's clearly associated with us and not confused with a mooring. And still these precautions wouldn 't help in the situation you describe.

As there are ways to retrieve a fouled anchor without a trip line these days, perhaps setting aside the anchor buoy for the foulest of bottoms is the way to go.

Happy Hooking!

Vice Commodore, OCC