I was looking through this website and reading the info on weapons from the golden age of piracy. For the long rifles, it reads:
It is interesting to note that although the British and French were known to use long rifles from the rigging (or more accurately from the fighting tops), the Spanish never did -- their Admiralty believed that the risk of fire in the rigging far outweighed the benefits of guns. Even as late as the 1700's, the Spanish used bows and crossbows in their fighting tops.
By the looks of the website, I take this fact with a grain of salt, so I'd really like to know if this is just an exaggeration or a made-up fact.
Sorry for the delay.
For that website, I would not rely on that page/site. No sources are sited at all for where the information came from. You're right to take it with a "grain of salt" as you say.
Based on the work of Ed Fox in the book Military Archery in the Seventeenth Century, you won't find any archers, outside of exceptional and weird cases here and there that just prove the rule, used by Europeans in formal military operations on land or sea. I study 1680s-1730s maritime activity in the Atlantic World, no evidence has come up for ship combat involving archery. It doesn't help the archers that ship combat shifted significantly after 1600 towards artillery fights at sea instead of boarding. Boardings happened, but getting in close with the enemy to board them wasn't considered the ultimate goal. Defeating them through gunfire was preferred.