What is this sail called...

[XTR]

On occasion I've seen ketch rigged boats with an inverted staysail between the masts. It looks to have the luff attached along a stay from the top of the main to the base of the mizzen and the clew sheeted to the top of the mizzen.

What's it called, and when would it be used?

[Looking]

Just guessing here, but I always thought it was called a 'Gollywobbler'??? Though I always saw it on a schooner rig.

[XTR]

You may be right about it being on schooners, that may be why I've only seen one or two. I was looking at a picture of a ketch this evening and the profile begs to have that hole filled. Just got me wondereing.

[ianhlnd]

Maybe called a "fisherman" i've seen one on a downeast 38 schooner and that's what the owner called it.

[Sabreman]

It's a Main staysail. Sir Francis Chichester had one on Gypsy Moth IV.

[camaraderie]

Mizzen staysail.

[XTR]

heheh, ok, that's four responses and four different answers. I don't feel so bad now.

[camaraderie]

ooops...reduce it to 3 different answers...I read your post wrong...main staysail if strung from top of the main mast.

[Valiente]

Originally Posted by XTR

On occasion I've seen ketch rigged boats with an inverted staysail between the masts. It looks to have the luff attached along a stay from the top of the main to the base of the mizzen and the clew sheeted to the top of the mizzen.

What's it called, and when would it be used?

Except for the word "inverted", I would have said "mizzen staysail", a reaching sail used to increase total area in the trades.
(the blue and white low triangular one)

But when you said "inverted", I thought of a fisherman, which I can't seem to find via Google but which I recall is a sort of inverted triangle that resembles a gaff-rig main topsail on a Marconi-rigged ketch, if that makes any sense.

[columbia36]

It's a mizzen staysail