Ancestry DNA

[Josie1968]

Hi all

I'm tempted to do Ancestry DNA and wondered whether anyone has done it and how they found it?

I joined Ancestry to do my family tree but sadly haven’t got far as I work full time, am at uni and have a family so time is limited. I’m thinking of cancelling my subscription but might do the DNA before I do!

Thanks

Josie

It all depends on who else has tested. Some people get loads of strong matches with cousins, second cousins, others have hardly any. (I fall into the hardly any category). If most of your matches are very distant on the 4th cousin level, your common ancestor could be very far back, you still have to do the traditional genealogy of births deaths and marriages to work out who is who and how people are related. Also Ancestry (or any other test) can only ever say what percentage of DNA or how many Centimorgans you share with another test taker and SUGGEST how you might be related. Lots of people think taking a DNA test does all the hard work for them, and it doesn't.

And that's without the issue of a rogue "not parent expected" event. Or matches not responding to your emails.

So in short yes it's worth it, but not a magic bullet.

@RandomGeocache Ok thank you .. that’s helpful. I was wondering whether it also tells me where my ancestors come from too, I think it does! :)

It will give you a best guess on where your ancestors come from, but it is pretty vague (covers large regions rather than specific towns). As more people with shared DNA take the test it will update so you get more information.

For example I did it a few years ago and it came back pretty much solid British/Irish heritage, but when I checked it a few months ago it had updated to 1% Iberian Peninsula, which actually fits with an old family story that I had assumed was untrue!

I did it very recently and found out my grandad is definitely not my grandad. Which I had no idea about. My mum is dead ( as are grandparents), I’m pretty sure she had no idea. Don’t know if my grandad knew, though I know he did know my grandma “had a gentleman friend” back in world war 2 so he probably had suspicions.

Anyway I’ve matched with a load of people from my new grandad’s side of the family. Only thing is from the dna it’s not clear which of two brothers is my grandad. I’ve matched with two people who could be half cousins or second cousins according to the dna shared percentage. Their dad and grandad is dead so not really anyone else to ask who would know.

You can also download your raw dna file from ancestry and upload it to places like gedmatch and myheritage and gedmatch especially will give you a much more detailed breakdown of your ethnic ancestry. Mine has flagged up my families Indigenous American routes (South America) which Ancestry didn’t. And from the very detailed family tree on my dad’s side we know this to be accurate as in the 1800s a lot of his family moved to Guyana. Some then after a while came back and I imagine there had been some mingling with the locals while out there as since then this South American dna has been passed down the family.