Ancestry is amazing, I joined in 2012 to get a better idea of my Mom's DNA I knew most of my Fathers. It lead to me leaving a comment on a members page and a yr. later they contacted me and we were 4th cousins, we set up a small reunion it was awesome. Fast forward to 2017 i received an email someone from Ancestry was trying to reach me. It turned out she was my niece from my baby brother my mother had put up for adoption in 1962. We had wanted to find him all of our lives, through my niece it took only a picture and i knew immediately he was our long lost brother. The reunion was so emotional but the best feeling ever! Thank you Ancestry for enriching our Family's Life.
Same story in our family. Through Ancestry DNA, our family recovered the descendants of two twin boys who were "adopted out" of our family in 1923. A am an East Coast'er, and the descendants of the missing twins live on the West Coast. We are planning a big family reunion for next year. For me, the big joy was in being to send these good folks photos of their Grandparents, their Great-Grandparents and their Great-Great-Grandparents, photos of the homes where they lived, and photos of their gavestones.
This video explains everything!! I have shared my DNA matches with paper 4th and 5th cousins (mother and son) and we can see Ancestry matches common to both of us in our well documented family trees. They are at the upper end of the cM scale so what Christa says here is exactly what I am experiencing. Our only problem now is that most of these common matches have only a few people in their tree and don't appear to be active after receiving their test results. Most have not linked to Ancestry. However, I feel so much better now I know the reason to this mystery!! Thanks Christa.
im in the side boat. I dont have any DNA matches to anyone on on of my great grandfathers side side yet all the records have led me to believe that all the ancestors on his side are my ancestors
Testing siblings, when parents aren't available to test, is one of the best ways to get the majority of your parents DNA represented. Testing 1st cousins (or aunts/uncles if they are available) will help you and your sister sort your matches between maternal/paternal.
Thanks for doing this video. I have two people who I know are my 3rd cousins who don't show up on my match list. One of them began to doubt that she was related to me and the other woman because of that. I tried to explain what you are saying but she didn't get. I am sharing this video with her because you explain it so much better. 😁
cyberlucy however......since its highly likely, at 98% likelihood, that 3rd cousins share DNA, the chances of TWO not sharing with you, is highly UNlikely, percentage-wise. Just saying.
My grandfathers father was unknown but his mother was a servant in a small town in NY , She was black from the south but light skin and light eyes. We found a 4th to 6th good match and see this famIy lived a few doors down from the family she worked for. It wasn’t by name but by the census of a small town we found this match.
I have relatives that took the DNA test, we know for certain that we are related but Ancestry says our DNA doesn’t match BUT we have shared DNA matches. WTH?
How close/distant are these relatives to you? For example, if they are a 2nd cousin or closer, you will always share DNA. So, they should be on your list if you both took the AncestryDNA test. However, if they are more distantly related than 2nd cousins, there is a chance that you just do not share any DNA.
That's interesting. They are around 6th cousins and we can see where we are related in our families and who are common grandfather was. We have shared DNA matches but we aren't a match ourselves which is weird. Then I have DNA matches that don't appear to be related to me at all - if we are related then they're so far removed, such as a distant cousins brothers aunts kid - I'm exaggerating here but the point is that we have no shared matches and I don't see them or any of their ancestors anywhere in my Tree (and my tree is extensive). I know DNA is randomly inherited but I didn't think it was this random.
Guild of Knightly Arts I have started looking at the centimorgan number. My distant cousin and I worked out how we were related through our trees but our DNA didn’t match even though we had some of the same matches. Looking at one of these matches I noticed that I’m related to that person at 12 cM across 1 segment. This helped me to determine that my relation to the distant cousin I share no DNA with is probably under 6 cM sense Ancestry and any standard DNA test will only count relations above 6 cM.
I know a big chunk of my FT and thought Ancestry dna wasn’t relevant for me, but I took an online genealogy course and found it very interesting and now I’m eagerly waiting for my results!
I've had my DNA results just before Christmas and found I have relatives that I never about. I have no matches with my close family but extended family. The family I grew up with aren't not related to me
You can't assume every blood relative out there has or will take the DNA test, and those who have passed away, and obviously never can.. so there will ALWAYS be the majority of ancestors you can't ever find out ALL your living relatives..or any, unless they've done the test too.
I helped 5 people on my maternal side find relatives. It was very rewarding. I would love to help more relatives & others find their ancestors. Ancestry helped me help others!
Its so amazing to hear that you have been able to help people in their journeys Kay, we wish you the very best of luck in all of your research to come!
Great and very informative video as usual. Took my DNA test some months ago and yes matched all my other relatives that had tested previously to me, except for one. Neither of my 2nd cousins and I match her, we were all very puzzled by this. But makes sense since she should be like a 5th cousin 1 removed I think. After seeing this video I understand it a little bit better. We don't have to freak out any more 😂
Each person who takes the DNA test agrees to share a certain degree of information with the people that they match. They do not agree to share information with people they share no DNA with. So, there are some privacy issues with your suggestion. That said, I'm curious, what circumstances you might see needing that kind of information. (~Crista)
Don't be discouraged, it probably just means that you are from a region that doesn't have a lot of people who have taken the DNA test. As more and more people take the test worldwide, you will see those numbers go up. In the meantime, work on your paper trail and make sure your DNA results are attached to your online tree and make sure that tree is set so that it can be viewed by the public. This will give you the best chance to make the connections that will lead to new discoveries and build DNA Circles. And when you're creating and maintaining your online tree, make sure you follow the formatting guidelines as accurately as possible, for instance the date format (3 Apr 1885, for example, rather than April 3, 1885) and the location format. This will make it easer for the software that does the matching to make those connections. Also try to keep the spelling and format of your family members' names consistent, and always always always use women's maiden names. If you don't know the maiden name, leave it blank, or use the five underscores to indicate an unknown surname.
I _currently_ have 187 fourth cousins or closer in my matches and only have 1 DNA circle. I did have 2 circles, but 1 disappeared after I changed the tree associated with my DNA; keep hoping it will reappear eventually.
This is so great! I also have three adopted daughters that are half sibs, and am working on my Italian family tree. Most recently a fourth cousin popped up from Italy, so I have done extensive research on her immediate family in Italy and in the states, but STILL cannot find our match. No question she is related, and on the side with fewer matches (my dad's side), but how...no idea yet.
Sounds like fun research, Dawn. A 4th cousin match is going to likely share a common set of great-great-great-grandparents. But, you could just share some extra DNA with that match. So, the connection might back another generation or two. I have no doubt you will figure it out.
Orsola also matches my highest third cousin match, who I believe is connected through an unknown parent, possibly here in Brooklyn. She has even more shared DNA with him.
I recently posted this to Twitter and Crista Cowan, you had commented but no real response. Dec 2016 test results, Ancestry deemed Dawn a 2nd cousin to me. My paternal aunt had her DNA tested in early 2017, she was 1st-2nd cousin DNA match to Dawn (they are 1C1R). In April 2017, the close cousin match to Dawn disappeared and was downgraded to a distant cousin with only 6.7 cM of shared DNA. The match between Dawn and my paternal aunt also downgraded to distant cousins. After much arguing back and forth between customer service reps at the higher level, the case has been deemed closed with this issue not being resolved. I didn't make a mistake! Dawn didn't make a mistake when she excitedly messaged me about the match and I confirmed it! EVERYONE looking at this looks at the account and connection at face value, what they see on screen, not what Dawn and I saw in 2016, so it must be a mistake on our part right? How does a DNA and tree 2nd cousin drop down to a distant cousin? I'm being told it was an update in algorithms that did it! I'm not convinced! Dawn is in the same DNA circles as I am for my paternal side. I'm not satisfied with the answers given to me by Ancestry and I don't know what to do. They refused to retest. I think it's something that glitched in their system. I've been researching for similar happenings anywhere and everywhere and there has never been a case where this has happened. I'm very disillusioned and disappointed by Ancestry. I'm frustrated, and so fed up I may very well throw in the towel and give up genealogy research altogether. When you lose faith in something, it's hard to regain it! I've been researching for almost 20 years. Dawn is a lady in her 70s, she'd been adopted and searched for 50 years. She did a DNA test and came up as a close match to me and she though't she'd found her bio family, but oh wait, no she hasn't! but no wait though, she matches some of the other cousins from the same family line...strange but true!
Had I had the foresight to record that info anywhere I would have! At the time, and as with anyone taking a DNA test, you don't ever think your close cousin will drop off! We shared the DNA required to be deemed 2nd cousins by Ancestry. In the chart, on Ancestry, that can be between 200-620 cM of DNA. Ancestry wouldn't have estimated the relationship as being a close match if the DNA wasn't there! Without a screenshot of this, there's really no way for me to prove it. Ancestry is looking at the current DNA and taking that information at face value and they are saying it's impossible for us to be 2nd cousins, even though we apparently were in 2016! It's so very frustrating! Our grandfathers are brothers, our dads are 1st cousins. Our surname is Robinson, both of Dawn's paternal grandparents are Robinsons with the grandmother being a more distant 3C1R to me. The paternal grandmother is the daughter of 2 Robinson parents and there's a lot of that throughout my Robinson family. Dawn also does share all the DNA circles that my family and I do and she looks really oddball because her cousins are all my close cousins and my close cousins are all her close cousins but when it comes to her and I, we're 5-8th cousins. I don't know what happened. I've been trying to very gently ask questions around the family, but it's almost like I've asked them cut off their arms! The question still remains though, how do 2nd cousins drop to 5-8th cousins?
If this woman had initially come up as a 5-8th cousin claiming to have the same gr-grandfather as me, I would have said look lady, go back and do some more research! The fact that Ancestry placed us at 2nd cousins when the results were in, then downgraded her to a distant cousin less than a year later tells me that it is a glitch or a malfunction somewhere. I've been looking for answers for nearly 2 years and for Ancestry to admit to a glitch or malfunction would be horrible publicity for them. I get it! In this modern age of technology, glitches happen right? Anyway, I am getting retested and Dawn is also getting retest. Seems Ancestry.com and Ancestry.ca, although same company, have different decisions on what constitutes grounds to be retested!
Oh wow.....interesting! I was wondering about this.....saw some inter related relatives but there page doesn't indicate we share DNA. Thanks for this info....helps me understand more clearly.
I still don’t understand why a tree linked to dna has to be public to be included in to ‘ circles’. Private trees can include masses of information I.e. names, place, date of birth, parents, siblings.
Because the nature of DNA Circles is that it exposes information in your tree to others in the circle. If you have decided that you want your tree to be private, we assume it is because you do not want the information in your tree shared with others.
One issue with the DNA Circles that may be a not-so-common issue, but one that I ran into, is that people in the circles may not have a DNA connection to the Ancestor of the circle. Within the circles, you are either in the circle by yourself or you're in a group within the circle. I believe the groupings are based off of a common ancestor in your family trees (who also descends from the ancestor of the circle), and also because you share DNA (the latter I can't confirm).... Anyway, I'm in a grouping with a few "2nd cousins" in our common ancestor's circle.... but what the Circle doesn't know, is that my grandfather had an affair with my grandmother's brother's wife, and the two people that I'm grouped with, are the progeny of my dad's half sibling who in-turn was the result of the affair. Based on the genealogy (family trees) these people in my grouping are my 2nd cousins, and we're grouped together under the name of our common great-grandfather. In this particular case, my group is connected to our common ancestor genealogically speaking, my grandmother's and their grandfather's great grandparents' circles... BUT, in reality since they are the genetic grandchildren of my grandfather, they have no direct DNA connection to anybody in the circles except to me... but, because we are part of the same group, and because our family trees have the same GG-Grandfather, AND because I'm a DNA match to everybody in my group and to everybody in the circle (It's not a huge circle), the result is they are part of a circle where they have no DNA matches (except one, me)... This loophole was giving the two others in my group a false match to the circle.... or at the very least, the concept of the circle isn't explained well enough anywhere. It's a touchy situation... and as a few of my newly minted half-cousins (formerly 2nd cousins) and I have looked into the family rumors, we almost stopped looking into the details because we kept showing up in the circles together and we all independently assumed that meant that the DNA was proving we all descended from the ancestor. BUT, since these 2nd cousins had so much DNA in common with me (quite a bit higher than any of my other 2nd cousins) I kept looking at the cousin matches that I have with these 2nd cousins. I noticed that they were matching up with people on my grandfather's side that they had no business matching with.... so I went back to the DNA circles, and noticed that when I clicked on anybody else in the circle and clicked on DNA matches, these two cousins of mine weren't in common... in this case the DNA Circles really muddied the waters.
Wow! That is quite the family situation. I can tell you that DNA Circles are still in beta and we are looking at some ways to improve them. Thank you for this specific use case. I will pass it along. (~Crista)
I am having problem. Connecting a match to the person in my tree. I watched your video on this subject. I think I know what is happening my ex sister in law attach my nephew to her tree. But I cannot attach him to my tree, how do I connect in this situation??
Crista, thank you for this presentation. I do have a question, does chemotherapy and/or radiation treatments effect the DNA results? This is if someone is currently having treatments.
I had my friend tested and I compared her DNA to mine on GEDmatch and it predicted that we are 7th cousins, but ancestrydna DNA doesn't have her on my list.
I thought about it for years, seeing how many of the elders of my family passed away through the years and due to distance between us I was not able to ask them more about my ancestry, and questions were left unanswered, all I know is my grandparents and great grandfather who migrated from France to Peru, will Ancestry work for me to find out more about family members?
Hi, David. Thanks for reaching out. We're excited to hear of your interest in researching your family history. We think there may be some things you can find on Ancestry. The best way to know is to try a free trial for the World Explorer subscription. We have an article that will explain how our free trials work. After reading the article, please let us know if you have any questions. support.ancestry.com/s/article/Ancestry-Free-Trial?language=en_US
I am a member and want to have my 90 year old aunt tested. She will not be building a tree herself and doesn’t want to pay monthly membership fees but I want access to her information how do I as her niece set this up? Extremely helpful video!
One thing I’ve started to notice lately by chance is that cousin (1) doesn’t show up in match list with another cousin (2). However if I go to that missing cousin (2) and look at matches, the other cousin (1) is there as a match. So same 2 cousins. One match list shows match, the other doesn’t. 2nd issue. A person doesn’t show up in match list. I search for the person in member directory. The person is a match. The Ancestry match lists are not showing all matches in each view. I will submit as issue but wanted to put it out there in case good explanation since Ancestry doesn’t respond to issue submissions.
1) If you check the "Removed Matches" folder of the one cousin, do you find the other in there? 2) How are you determining someone "doesn't show up in match list?"
No. Half-siblings will be listed as "Close Family" and they will share between 1435-2083 centimorgans of DNA. How much DNA do these two individuals share?
Hi Della, thank you for the question. Ancestry is not set up to upload DNA tests from other companies. If you are interested in taking advantage of the features of AncestryDNA you are welcome to participate in AncestryDNA. You can purchase a test directly from us by heading over to www.ancestry.com/dna/
Hi there Charlotte, thanks so much for stopping by with this great request! We've raised this with the relevant team, and hope to soon be able to offer this on future videos. Thank you sincerely for bring this to our attention! 🌱❤️
Greetings from Cambodia. I see this video is at least 4 years old, but I'm hoping you might entertain a question. Here goes: I found out this week, my paternal aunt is not the biological daughter of my grandfather. My cousin's and I would like to know who my aunt's father was. My grandmother would have been 20 when she became pregnant around Valentine's Day 1935 with her third child. She already had 2 children (my father and eldest aunt) when this baby was born. A piece I got from Ancestry DNA that's curious to me is that I received notification of a 2ND-3RD COUSIN DNA MATCH on my paternal grandmother's side that indicates in our family trees that this DNA match and I would be 5th cousins. This seems like a stretch to me is leading me to believe we are a closer DNA match than 5th cousins. I'm wondering if my aunt's father was actually my DNA 2nd-3rd cousin DNA match's 35 year-old Great Grandfather might possibly have impregnated my 20-year-old Grandmother. Could I be on the right track?
Hi, Kim. Thanks for getting in touch. We can certainly understand why you'd want to find this information. Wow, this seems like a bit of a complicated situation. We are only able to determine how much DNA is shared with matches. If you have a match that is determined to be a 5th cousin, that is what we'd suppose. It seems that you may have to do a bit more to find the information you're looking for. Maybe a paper trail of some sort. We hope you can find those answers you're looking for. We have an article that you may find helpful. support.ancestry.com/s/article/Making-the-Most-of-AncestryDNA-Matches?language=en_US
That's no problem at all, Kim. We wish you all the very best as you navigate your family history and trust that you will call on us anytime you need our support. You may also find this guide to different DNA match categories of interest as it can really help you make better sense of how you and a genetic match are connected in a familial sense: support.ancestry.com/s/global-search/cat?language=en_US . We wish you every success and hope to see you back on site researching sometime soon.🌳
Oh and a 3rd issue discovered through collaboration with a cousin. My match list doesn’t show her as match to another cousin. However her match list does shows connection to that cousin and she sees me as match in her list. Why doe my match list not show the match but hers does? This is not helpful and means we are missing possible matches.
Are you talking about Shared Matches between you and your cousin? This view only shows 4th cousins and closer (as determined by the amount of shared DNA). If the person does not share enough DNA with you to be a 4th cousin they will not show up on your Shared Matches list with her. If they share enough DNA with her to be estimated as a 4th cousin, the match would show up on the Shared Matches with you from her view.
Very informative. Thank you. You said that testing a sibling will catch about 87% of the DNA that I didn't inherit. Is it correct, then, to say that if enough siblings are tested, all my parents' DNA will have been collected?
That is correct. My science team tells me that a couple needs to have a minimum of 5 children in order for 100% of their DNA to be passed on to the next generation.
My 5 siblings and I have been tested and we match as expected, full siblings! Unfortunately our parents are long deceased but we have a paternal aunt and a maternal aunt who have been tested. I also have a 1st cousin match from each side, and several paternal and maternal 2nd cousin matches. I am interested in learning how I can use these results to differentiate which segments my siblings and I inherited from our mother and which we inherited from our father. What resources would you recommend that I study?
You can use the SHARED MATCHES feature to sort out your maternal versus paternal matches. So, for example on your DNA match list, click on View Match with your paternal aunt. Then click on Shared Matches. Every match you have in common with her, likely came from your father's side of the family. Go through each of them and put a note in that they are a paternal match. Then do the same with your maternal aunt. Now, you have a basic place to start figuring out where they fit into the family tree. Does that make sense.
Hi Crista. Got my dna and my mom and Dads...curiously my dna doesn’t seem to fit my parents...I was hoping you could explain. My mom is 63% Great Britain. My dad 56% European South and 41% European East.... Only 39% of my dna belongs to my mom, 53% to my dad. Now...I have 20% European west in my dna...there is only 1% European west in both my mom and Dads test. How can I have 20% if combined my parents have only 2%??So....please explain. This has left me very confused.
Thanks so much for this video!! I found it very informative and helpful. I hope questions are permitted here. I plan to get an Ancestry DNA test done before the end of the year regardless of how you answer. Here is my situation: Based on family reports and on the marriage record from one of her sons, one of my great-grandmothers was probably a Robinson, but the only document I find listing her maiden name--her marriage record--says Alice M. Cowan. I think she may be the sister to Charles Robinson who married my great-grandfather's half-sister, Hester; because he lived in the same township where she was married, and because the census records show that he has a sister Alice about the right age. If my great-grandmother Alice M. ____ is the sister of Charles Robinson, would I be able to see a clear difference in the level of my DNA relationship to the descendants of the Charles-Hester line (double third cousin--or more precisely 1.5X) as compared with the descendants of my great-grandfather's other half siblings (half third cousins??). I know I can go back and review the video and check to see how those bars might overlap, and I will do that right away, but I promise I will be thrilled to receive an answer to this question.
I find this so interesting. I do not know much about my mom's side. But I know alot about my dads so I have always wondered if I could find so of my maternal side this way. She does not want to be tested and she will not tell me why. I know that she did not have a very good childhood.
Crista, it would be so helpful if you could do a video on how to help plugin a new person from an Ancestry DNA Circle Discoveries into our Trees. I have spent hours trying to figure out where some of these people may fit in just to come up with nothing. Further more, it doesn't seem to make sense, if these people are Great (+) Grandparents, their birth dates imply a timeline that there isn't openings so I am extremely confused.
New Ancestor Discoveries are simply letting you know that there is a group of your DNA matches who all descend from a common ancestor. It doesn't mean that person is your ancestor (though they could be). They could also be a spouse (or the parents of a spouse) of a great-great-aunt (or some other type of tangential relationship). This is one of the (many) reasons why it is important to also trace all of the children and grandchildren of your ancestors.
Sorry I see that I wasn't clear. I was actually talking about DNA Circles; New Ancestor Discoveries. I printed all of mine out because I have been trying to map them out. Are they Grandparents? I was able to prove three people were Great Grandparents.
I’ve got a 920cm match with 13% dna possibly a 1st cousin, a genealogists told me she is matched to me on my mother’s side but my mum and grandad have done ancestry test and this 1st cousin doesn’t share an matches with my mum or grandad, is my genealogist correct or is this cousin related on my dads side ? Also I’ve just had a 20% dna 1368cm I don’t know why it’s so hard to figure this out. I am looking for my father
I have looked for days to find DNA Ancestors. My results came in and gave me possibilities only. If you can please explain how people put a photo of "DNA Ancestor" in their tree? I have nothing, unless I am very unlucky or stupid. I am not being critical of this company. I am so very frustrated seeing others finding a real DNA Match and talk about their DNA ancestors. I only see "Shared Surnames". If I am reading my results wrong or not going to the correct part of my results, please help me.
Hi Sherrell. I understand how the process of learning how to work with your AncestryDNA results can be a little overwhelming. But, you've got this. I'm here to help. First thing to understand is this: If they show up on your AncestryDNA Match list (especially if they are a 4th cousin or closer) they are definitely related to you. So, let's start with the first person on your list. How much DNA do you share with them? (To find that out, click VIEW MATCH with that person. Then click the little "i" in the circle next to the confidence level.
Every person has a different ethnicity admixture. Since your son and your 1st cousin only share about 6% of their DNA, it is not guaranteed that you will have the same ethnicity admixture. Your son got 50% of his DNA from his father. Your cousin got 50% of their DNA from their other parent that is not related to you. The only way to know for sure what you inherited from each of your parents and which bits you passed on to your son, is for you to also test.
Hmm. Are there any benefits to testing an elderly individual as far as family matches go? Will it help link family if grandchildren/great grandchildren eventually take the test?
Yes. Always test the oldest living generation first. Each subsequent generation only gets half of that person's DNA. That means that there is half of their DNA that does not get passed to each child. Testing the oldest generation will also help you make connections to ancestors further back in time.
So what do I do if my parents took the test at my request but have forgotten their login info, so they don't know which DNA test results are who's. The dna map looks so similar I can't tell them apart? It shows my mom attached to my dad on my family tree.
So, you think they may have mislabeled their tests? The easiest way to tell them apart is to look at the Shared Matches you have with each of them. Then, look at the family trees for each of those matches and match it up with what you know about your parents' ancestry.
From YOUR DNA Match list, click on your match with one of your parents and then click Shared Matches. That will show you which DNA Matches you have in common with that parent. Based on the family trees of those matches, you should be able to figure out which side of the family that person is connected to. That will tell you if your parents mixed up the labeling of their test results or not.
I recommend you to reset their passwords and then link them up to your tree. Since they did the test at your request, hopefully they will let you manage and then take care of their tests going forward.
Hi Steve and thanks for getting in touch. We're afraid we can only accept saliva samples from living people. We're sorry for any disappointment this might cause.
I am having an interesting issue with one of my husband's dna matches. He shows up as a likely 2 or 3rd cousin with 319 CMs. He shares a number of my husband other matches, including many of those we have confirmed with shared ancestors as 2nd to 4th cousins. They are all on my husband's mother's line. They are not only coming from my husband's maternal grandmother's line (Shaw & Mayberrry) , but also from my husband's maternal grandfather's mother's line (Barker & Youst). But, he does not share the matches that come down from my husband's maternal grandfather's father's line (Wallace & Tygard). But, based on your presentation, perhaps he just didn't get any of that dna. I am beginning to think that on of this young man's parents is the child of one of my husband's aunts or uncle that are his mom's siblings, or he is the child of one of my husband's cousins from that same line. The problem is that he has a tree and there is no indication that he was adopted. His parents, grandparents on both sides, and great grandparents are in no way connected to my husband's mom's highly documented line. No similar surnames and no similar locations at any time in their lives. I sent him one message when he first showed up, commenting that it appeared he had some step parents listed as parents (different surnames). He removed the step parents, put parents with the same surname, said thank you, and then stopped responding to my question. He even matches my husband's next highest dna match, a known 2nd cousin one time removed that my husband actually met when he was a child. He also matches my husband's 3rd cousin, that is the daughter of that 2nd cousin one time removed. My point is that I am positive that I have my husband's ancestors correctly listed in our tree on his mom's side. My husband is definitely not adopted. But, this young man on my husband's list either is adopted or has an adopted parent or has an unknown parental event. I want to help him, but he currently doesn't seem to want any help. I have created a mirror tree, not attached to my own, but as a free floating branch on my main tree page. It was my way of confirming that there are no shared relatives and no shared locations. Any suggestions on additional ways I might work this out without his help? It is really driving me nuts. Char
Char - There are a lot of people who do not know that they are adopted or that there is a mis-attributed parentage event in their family tree. You state that this individual shares matches with both of your husband's grandparents. That, and the fact that he shares 319 cM with your husband, leads me to believe that he is a either a 1st cousin 1x removed or a 1st cousin 2x removed. Meaning he is the grandchild or great-grandchild of one of your husband's maternal aunts or uncles. Do you know the age of this individual?
I don't know his age but his parents were born in the early 1950's. I realize this isn't the best way to approach this, since he has not asked for my help and has not even acknowledge my input. Just thought I would get ahead of this, because that is my nature. I agree with your assessment. I probably shouldn't have posted the question since I only have one side of this. Just that the video gave me some ideas and I wanted to put it down clearly. Char
So, given the testing of enough descendants, one could reverse engineer the dna of Deceased ancestors? Could one then identify their likely physical characteristics and likely ethnic background based on their genes much like ancestry dna does for the living in the tests?
Great question. And, the answer is yes. It is possible. Here is some work AncestryDNA science team did a few years ago to test the theory. blogs.ancestry.com/ancestry/2014/12/16/ancestrydna-achieves-scientific-advancement-in-human-genome-reconstruction/
Hey all..I'm trying to figure out a mystery..I have my grandmother and mothers DNA..then me..my mom passed but why would my mother have cousins and my grandmother but there are BIG differences in level of cousin..for Instance..my mom and my grandmother are related to several cousins that are Whitaker's..but most are 4th cousin toy grandmother and 2nd cousin to my mom...inbreeding? It's kinda scary cause my grandmother won't say who my grandfather is..and I'm tripping out in how I can be closer to some of these cousins than her..
Focus less on the predicted relationship and more on the shared centimorgans (amount of shared DNA between the matches). So, for example, how many centimorgans of DNA do you share with one of these matches versus how much your mom shares with that same match and how much your grandma shares with that same match. Does that make sense?
Hi Christa, Just watched this great video, "You Won't Match Everyone You are Related To" which was just published, Oct. 2017. You had mentioned that when you go beyond 2nd cousin, you might not match all of your cousins. I have a situation where I didn't match either my 5th cousin, or her Aunt. I realized Ancestry only post matches 6 centimorgans, and above. I did take my DNA and uploaded it to Gedmatch. I did show a match, but with 4+ to 5 centimorgans on two chromosomes. I was wondering why? Does that mean we are still 4th to 5th cousins?
I would like to go another step further to my post and your reply. None of the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th cousins of my 4th to 5th cousin and her Aunt do not show up in my matches. Does that mean we still can be 4th to 5th cousins? Thanks.
Yes they are. Also, another point in all of this, is all of my known 3rd cousin matches to me (we have common great-great grandparents) that Ancestry says that they are Distant or 5th to 8th cousins with very low centimorgans. Does this mean that a lot of DNA was lost randomly through the generations?
Look at the amounts of Shared DNA (you can do this by clicking on the little "i" in the circle next to the confidence level on the VIEW MATCH page. Known 3rd cousins will, typically, share an average of 90 cM of DNA (but, it can be as low as 0).
Amanda Shipman born in Arkansas 1857, and married a Sumner. She was married in Arkansas, to a Sumner, and then moved to Oklahoma. I don't have much on her.
DNA Circles are automatically created when you have a group of DNA Matches who all have the same ancestor in their public family tree. To remove yourself from a DNA Circle you can make your family tree private.
What about when some one had 3rd great grandparents were first cousins and the 4th great grandparents were first cousins to? How will the DNA work when this happen
If your parents were 1st cousins, you would notice an increase in the amount of shared DNA between you and your other close family members. But, at that distance (3rd and 4th great-grandparents) it is unlikely to have much of an effect at all.
Hello Ancestry. Our ancestry changed his surname from the one before. We know both surnames. With your professional researchers, can you guys find all that share the same dna but different surnames?
We have just received the test results and matches for one of my wife's 2nd cousins (or rather that is the relationship that we have in the tree). Ancestry shows no match between them, and there are no common matches. My wife's '2nd cousin' does match as expected with his 1st cousin. My wife doesn't match his 1st cousin, and again there are no common matches. My wife's Ancestry test was done a few years ago, and her '2nd cousin's test was very recent. I know that there have been changes to the testing during that period. Would there be any merit in retesting my wife using the latest test, or should we simply accept that there is no biological relationship and now try to work out where the biological tree diverts from the accepted family tree? There are some weak common matches on GedMatch between my wife and her '2nd cousin', but no shared DNA.
If you wife does not match her 2nd cousin there is likely a biological break in the tree. Rather than testing your wife again, I would recommend testing other of her family members. For example, if you test one of her siblings, you will be able to tell if they are full or half siblings. If their results come back indicating that they are full siblings, then test a first cousin on that side of the family tree to see if the break is at the parent/grandparent level.
Many thanks. I think that I have now resolved the mystery, through use of the tools at GedMatch and the charts at The Genetic Genealogist website. I think that the relationships are half-1C and half-2C. There is evidence in the birth records that also support this. By setting the thresholds very low in GedMatch 1-1 test, I found a small DNA match between my wife and her 'second cousin'. The total length of matching DNA would support a half-2C relationship. By the way, it would be really helpful if the Ancestry site provided more visibility of the chromosome segment matches. The 'Amount of Shared DNA' info is valuable, but more detail would be a really big improvement.
Hey Daniel Han. Thanks for checking out this video from deep in our archives. We're delighted to see your interest in broadening your knowledge of your family history and building a tree to be proud of. We recognize that this is not always easy but can assure you that we're here to accompany you as you strive to achieve your goals. It is essential to note that Ancestry does not build the family trees that appear on our website. Each family tree is constructed and owned by the member who created it. Our website is a self service resource which provides the perfect home for all those seeking to realize their own research goals and our subscriptions unlock access to our vault of historical records, public family tree database as well as a host of other innovative research tools. Click here to learn more about these features : support.ancestry.com/s/article/What-to-do-with-an-Ancestry-Membership?language=en_US. Rest assured that we have significant resources available to assist you and would first suggest checking out this guide from our dedicated support center which should have you researching like a pro in no time support.ancestry.com/s/article/Getting-Started-Lesson-1-Starting-Your-Tree . Once you've entered the information you do know then our tools such as Hints wil lstart to assist you with worthy suggestions for you to review and add to your tree if relevant. We hope this gives some clarity but please stop by and see us again anytime you need our assistance. Best of luck on behalf of all our team! 🌳
My DNA matches everyone on all of my branches going back to the early 1600's and late 1500's except for my fathers mother's line, which is Irish Potato Famine Irish, I know three of my Irish Great Grandparents, one male and two females, I have their parent's names, but I can't find anything in County Cork or the Munster area for them. They all left Ireland prior to 1860.
I have an uncle under close family-His niece is my 1rst cousin. I'm adopted and we have connected. Her mom would be my aunt. Does this mean my aunt and uncle's sibling , a male would be my Birthfather?
Have you explained to them how having their test results will help your family history research? They may not be interested in the results but if they know how beneficial that information would be in helping your research efforts, maybe they'd reconsider.
When a set of siblings from one family marries a set of siblings from another family, their children are double first cousins. That means that they share double the amount of DNA as regular first cousins. Assuming no more intermarriage between the two families, the amount of shared DNA between succeeding generations will be double what is expected.
It is possible. When you take an AncestryDNA test, we compare your DNA to the other 7 million people who have taken the test and show you a list of people you share DNA with. If someone is your 2nd cousin, for example, one of their parents would be the 1st cousin of one of your parents. Using this information, you can contact them and find out who in their family could possibly be your biological father.
Just ordered the test and am about to spit. For me, I am adopted and it was closed so I don't know ANYTHING about my biological parents or family. Is this going to be a problem since I can't make a tree?
No problem at all. In fact, you will get a DNA Match List that very likely could lead to the identity of your biological parents. So, you may have a family tree sooner than you think.
I'm late to this video (very informative!), but I'm hoping you can help. I was messaged on Ancestry.com by a young man looking for his birth father. We share 441 cM across 22 segments. My question is, if he shares more cM/segments with my brother, is it likelier that the match would be on my dad's side of the family? And is that at dad's 1st cousin level(as per answer to another question here)? Unfortunately, only 1(maternal) uncle has tested. I want to help this man, but I come from a huge extended family, & trying to figure this out is making me crazy!
Hi Max - I have DNA tested both of my parents, one of my grandparents (the rest were deceased before testing became available), two of my dad's siblings, my mom's siblings, and 1st cousins of each of my parents from both sides of their trees.
What if your biological brother has zero matches with you . In fact, he has very few matches at all to anyone. I think he's not my real brother and it was a baby switch at the hospital. My mother was a former novice in a Benedictine convent so I don't think it could be anything else.
That's because you only got half of his DNA. There is a whole other half of his DNA that you did not get. So, he will match people on that half that you won't.
Ancestry I don’t know much about DNA but I believe the splitting of DNA is the Creators way of continuing life on this earth without the same genetics crossing and causing defects!
Hello, this video was great. I have a second cousin who shows up as a match at 303 centimorgans, on 16 segments. Her daughter, also shows up as my second cousin, at 301 centimorgans, on 18 segments. My second cousins husband, shows as my 3rd cousin, with 123 centimorgans, across 6 segments. I understand that I am related on both sides, but how are the mother and daughter my second cousins, with almost equal centimorgans?
I understand, but both mother and daughter are listed as direct second cousins. I thought the daughter would be a 2nd cousin 1x removed, but she isn't. So how do I list in the tree? Is the daughter a 2nd cousin 1x removed by default?
Daughter is a 2nd cousin 1x removed on her mother's side and a 3rd cousin 1x removed on her father's side (if I understood your original post correctly). That means that she will share 0-236 centimorgans with you that she inherited from her mom and 0-114 cM that she inherited from her dad. The computer that assigns people to a category of relationship on your DNA match list does not know how she is related or where she fits in your family tree. All it knows is that she shares XX amount of DNA with you and that, based on the law of averages, she might be a 2nd cousin. When you enter her into your tree, with the correct relationships on both her father's side and mother's side, she will be where she belongs. Does that make sense?
Ancestry gives a range of possibilities in addition to the predicted second cousin relationship with the mom. It also suggests a 1st cousin 1x removed. So if the father is a 3rd cousin and the mother is a 1 cousin 1x removed, would that make the daughter a 2nd cousin, nothing removed?
Everyone gets 50% of their DNA from their father and 50% from their mother. What are you seeing that leads you to believe that you only are seeing DNA from your mother?
Hi Mannie, Has your mother or someone from her side of the family that you know taken the AncestryDNA test? If so, you can use the SHARED MATCHES feature with that person to create a custom group with all of your maternal matches. Then, whatever is left on your main match list is likely from your father's side. Does that help?
Excellent! Look down the right-hand side of the page. Some of your matches should say "Mother's Side." How many centimorgans of DNA do you share with the top person on your list that does NOT say "mother's side?"
Hi, Paranormal. Thanks for asking that great question. A second cousin twice removed would share around the same amount of DNA as a 3rd-4th cousin match. We know it can be puzzling when you can't see matches that seem like they should be on your list. DNA passes down randomly, you get 50% of your DNA from each parent. That means there is 50% of both parent's DNA that you did not get. Because of that, sometimes you may have a cousin, maybe a 3rd or 4th cousin who will not show up on your match list. They may have not inherited enough DNA in common to be matched. Please let us know if you have other questions.
@@AncestryUS thank you so much your reply. Much appreciated. I have read your comment with interest. And I completely understand where your coming from. So thank you so much for this information. Also another question I wanted to ask is. So my mother and I gedmatched this suppose 2C2R who is in our family tree. His end is kosher. However he shares a zero DNA with me and my mother. I've questioned whether or not something may of happened the down the line. However many others have said it is definitely possible for a 2CTR to share zero DNA due to the random inheritance. Also I wanted to ask. If a adoption occurred before 1927 could a random woman put her name on the Birth certificate as the child's mother. And no one would know? Or would the mother have to be biological to register herself as the birth parent. Any information would be highly appreciated. Kind regards.
Thanks very much for getting back in touch! We here at Ancestry Social Support are not researchers, so we wouldn't be qualified to provide research assistance, however, Crista has another great video when it comes to genealogical research and adoption that could provide a few tips to you: th-cam.com/video/bemP0LQ4lik/w-d-xo.html Additionally, a good option for you to verify this relationship could be for this cousin to share their DNA test with you on Ancestry, so you can see if you have any matches in common. If you can find DNA Matches in their match list that you and/or your mom have, this suggests that this match and you are indeed related but don't show as matches due to what you've each inherited. We hope this information helps a little further, and we wish you all the best in your continued research!
Crista, as a matter of interest, do you have photos for ALL of your great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents, but just choose not to upload some? Or have you simply not been able to locate photos for a few of them? Congrats on the John O'Brien brick wall, BTW!
Ancestry is amazing, I joined in 2012 to get a better idea of my Mom's DNA I knew most of my Fathers. It lead to me leaving a comment on a members page and a yr. later they contacted me and we were 4th cousins, we set up a small reunion it was awesome. Fast forward to 2017 i received an email someone from Ancestry was trying to reach me. It turned out she was my niece from my baby brother my mother had put up for adoption in 1962. We had wanted to find him all of our lives, through my niece it took only a picture and i knew immediately he was our long lost brother. The reunion was so emotional but the best feeling ever! Thank you Ancestry for enriching our Family's Life.
That's amazing, Crystal! Thank you so much for sharing.
Ancestry is expensive!!!
Same story in our family. Through Ancestry DNA, our family recovered the descendants of two twin boys who were "adopted out" of our family in 1923. A am an East Coast'er, and the descendants of the missing twins live on the West Coast. We are planning a big family reunion for next year. For me, the big joy was in being to send these good folks photos of their Grandparents, their Great-Grandparents and their Great-Great-Grandparents, photos of the homes where they lived, and photos of their gavestones.
This video explains everything!! I have shared my DNA matches with paper 4th and 5th cousins (mother and son) and we can see Ancestry matches common to both of us in our well documented family trees. They are at the upper end of the cM scale so what Christa says here is exactly what I am experiencing. Our only problem now is that most of these common matches have only a few people in their tree and don't appear to be active after receiving their test results. Most have not linked to Ancestry. However, I feel so much better now I know the reason to this mystery!! Thanks Christa.
I will be happy to find just one person from my fathers side of the family.
Likewise. I have zero paternal matches and over 1,000 maternal DNA and tree matches.
Same. How is that even possible?
Anita Foster Right I feel ya, I still haven’t found any relatives on my fathers side.
Well I need to find someone on my mums side
im in the side boat. I dont have any DNA matches to anyone on on of my great grandfathers side side yet all the records have led me to believe that all the ancestors on his side are my ancestors
Crista, my parents are both gone. I asked my sister to test and she has so many more matches than I do! It was amazing AND so helpful.
Testing siblings, when parents aren't available to test, is one of the best ways to get the majority of your parents DNA represented. Testing 1st cousins (or aunts/uncles if they are available) will help you and your sister sort your matches between maternal/paternal.
Thanks for doing this video. I have two people who I know are my 3rd cousins who don't show up on my match list. One of them began to doubt that she was related to me and the other woman because of that. I tried to explain what you are saying but she didn't get. I am sharing this video with her because you explain it so much better. 😁
cyberlucy however......since its highly likely, at 98% likelihood, that 3rd cousins share DNA, the chances of TWO not sharing with you, is highly UNlikely, percentage-wise. Just saying.
I got matched to the first cousin of my father in America.
My grandfathers father was unknown but his mother was a servant in a small town in NY , She was black from the south but light skin and light eyes. We found a 4th to 6th good match and see this famIy lived a few doors down from the family she worked for. It wasn’t by name but by the census of a small town we found this match.
That's some great genealogy research work! Way to go.
I have relatives that took the DNA test, we know for certain that we are related but Ancestry says our DNA doesn’t match BUT we have shared DNA matches. WTH?
How close/distant are these relatives to you? For example, if they are a 2nd cousin or closer, you will always share DNA. So, they should be on your list if you both took the AncestryDNA test. However, if they are more distantly related than 2nd cousins, there is a chance that you just do not share any DNA.
That's interesting. They are around 6th cousins and we can see where we are related in our families and who are common grandfather was. We have shared DNA matches but we aren't a match ourselves which is weird. Then I have DNA matches that don't appear to be related to me at all - if we are related then they're so far removed, such as a distant cousins brothers aunts kid - I'm exaggerating here but the point is that we have no shared matches and I don't see them or any of their ancestors anywhere in my Tree (and my tree is extensive). I know DNA is randomly inherited but I didn't think it was this random.
Would a Y-DNA test be better for matching up distant cousins of a male line?
I got a first cousin who we share matches with but we don't show up related either. I think ancestry dna is an inaccurate source.
Guild of Knightly Arts I have started looking at the centimorgan number. My distant cousin and I worked out how we were related through our trees but our DNA didn’t match even though we had some of the same matches. Looking at one of these matches I noticed that I’m related to that person at 12 cM across 1 segment. This helped me to determine that my relation to the distant cousin I share no DNA with is probably under 6 cM sense Ancestry and any standard DNA test will only count relations above 6 cM.
I know a big chunk of my FT and thought Ancestry dna wasn’t relevant for me, but I took an online genealogy course and found it very interesting and now I’m eagerly waiting for my results!
I've had my DNA results just before Christmas and found I have relatives that I never about. I have no matches with my close family but extended family. The family I grew up with aren't not related to me
You can't assume every blood relative out there has or will take the DNA test, and those who have passed away, and obviously never can.. so there will ALWAYS be the majority of ancestors you can't ever find out ALL your living relatives..or any, unless they've done the test too.
Please update us on your john obrien saga when you find out!! Im keenly interested in your story!!
I helped 5 people on my maternal side find relatives. It was very rewarding. I would love to help more relatives & others find their ancestors. Ancestry helped me help others!
Its so amazing to hear that you have been able to help people in their journeys Kay, we wish you the very best of luck in all of your research to come!
Great and very informative video as usual. Took my DNA test some months ago and yes matched all my other relatives that had tested previously to me, except for one. Neither of my 2nd cousins and I match her, we were all very puzzled by this. But makes sense since she should be like a 5th cousin 1 removed I think.
After seeing this video I understand it a little bit better. We don't have to freak out any more 😂
A big problem I find, is so many people haven't done a family tree and just taken the dna test.
G94 - You are soooooo right. It is so frustrating 😕
Yes that’s what’s I’m finding!! There’s one match that is very high but I can’t find the spot where they fit in
this is especially true for adoptees
cclaude55 that's because we know absolutely nothing about our heritage
Yes, the comment was made, because I'm in the same boat as an adoptee!
The key is to limit results to common ancestors. I have matched many many fourth and fifth cousins. Obituaries are of great help as well
Great to hear!
there should be a function to find shared matches between people you do not yourself match with.
Each person who takes the DNA test agrees to share a certain degree of information with the people that they match. They do not agree to share information with people they share no DNA with. So, there are some privacy issues with your suggestion. That said, I'm curious, what circumstances you might see needing that kind of information. (~Crista)
I am such a Crista Cowen fan!!!
My father has Alzheimer’s, I am not sure we could get him to spit in a DNA test tube. What is another way to test his DNA.
Lisa Reed I
Wow, 84 DNA Circles! I have 60 myself, which I thought was a lot. That's incredible.
how many dna matches do you have that are 4th cousins or closer? I have no dna circles.
About 1800 4th cousin and closer matches. I have 820 pages of matches altogether.
oh wow. lol thanks for replying. I only have 106 4th cousins or closer matches so maybe thats why I have no circles.
Don't be discouraged, it probably just means that you are from a region that doesn't have a lot of people who have taken the DNA test. As more and more people take the test worldwide, you will see those numbers go up. In the meantime, work on your paper trail and make sure your DNA results are attached to your online tree and make sure that tree is set so that it can be viewed by the public. This will give you the best chance to make the connections that will lead to new discoveries and build DNA Circles. And when you're creating and maintaining your online tree, make sure you follow the formatting guidelines as accurately as possible, for instance the date format (3 Apr 1885, for example, rather than April 3, 1885) and the location format. This will make it easer for the software that does the matching to make those connections. Also try to keep the spelling and format of your family members' names consistent, and always always always use women's maiden names. If you don't know the maiden name, leave it blank, or use the five underscores to indicate an unknown surname.
I _currently_ have 187 fourth cousins or closer in my matches and only have 1 DNA circle. I did have 2 circles, but 1 disappeared after I changed the tree associated with my DNA; keep hoping it will reappear eventually.
This is so great! I also have three adopted daughters that are half sibs, and am working on my Italian family tree. Most recently a fourth cousin popped up from Italy, so I have done extensive research on her immediate family in Italy and in the states, but STILL cannot find our match. No question she is related, and on the side with fewer matches (my dad's side), but how...no idea yet.
Sounds like fun research, Dawn. A 4th cousin match is going to likely share a common set of great-great-great-grandparents. But, you could just share some extra DNA with that match. So, the connection might back another generation or two. I have no doubt you will figure it out.
Orsola also matches my highest third cousin match, who I believe is connected through an unknown parent, possibly here in Brooklyn. She has even more shared DNA with him.
This certainly explains why I don't share DNA with those who I'm related to by documentation.
I recently posted this to Twitter and Crista Cowan, you had commented but no real response. Dec 2016 test results, Ancestry deemed Dawn a 2nd cousin to me. My paternal aunt had her DNA tested in early 2017, she was 1st-2nd cousin DNA match to Dawn (they are 1C1R). In April 2017, the close cousin match to Dawn disappeared and was downgraded to a distant cousin with only 6.7 cM of shared DNA. The match between Dawn and my paternal aunt also downgraded to distant cousins. After much arguing back and forth between customer service reps at the higher level, the case has been deemed closed with this issue not being resolved. I didn't make a mistake! Dawn didn't make a mistake when she excitedly messaged me about the match and I confirmed it! EVERYONE looking at this looks at the account and connection at face value, what they see on screen, not what Dawn and I saw in 2016, so it must be a mistake on our part right? How does a DNA and tree 2nd cousin drop down to a distant cousin? I'm being told it was an update in algorithms that did it! I'm not convinced! Dawn is in the same DNA circles as I am for my paternal side. I'm not satisfied with the answers given to me by Ancestry and I don't know what to do. They refused to retest. I think it's something that glitched in their system. I've been researching for similar happenings anywhere and everywhere and there has never been a case where this has happened. I'm very disillusioned and disappointed by Ancestry. I'm frustrated, and so fed up I may very well throw in the towel and give up genealogy research altogether. When you lose faith in something, it's hard to regain it! I've been researching for almost 20 years. Dawn is a lady in her 70s, she'd been adopted and searched for 50 years. She did a DNA test and came up as a close match to me and she though't she'd found her bio family, but oh wait, no she hasn't! but no wait though, she matches some of the other cousins from the same family line...strange but true!
How many centimorgans did you share with Dawn previously?
Had I had the foresight to record that info anywhere I would have! At the time, and as with anyone taking a DNA test, you don't ever think your close cousin will drop off! We shared the DNA required to be deemed 2nd cousins by Ancestry. In the chart, on Ancestry, that can be between 200-620 cM of DNA. Ancestry wouldn't have estimated the relationship as being a close match if the DNA wasn't there! Without a screenshot of this, there's really no way for me to prove it. Ancestry is looking at the current DNA and taking that information at face value and they are saying it's impossible for us to be 2nd cousins, even though we apparently were in 2016! It's so very frustrating! Our grandfathers are brothers, our dads are 1st cousins. Our surname is Robinson, both of Dawn's paternal grandparents are Robinsons with the grandmother being a more distant 3C1R to me. The paternal grandmother is the daughter of 2 Robinson parents and there's a lot of that throughout my Robinson family. Dawn also does share all the DNA circles that my family and I do and she looks really oddball because her cousins are all my close cousins and my close cousins are all her close cousins but when it comes to her and I, we're 5-8th cousins. I don't know what happened. I've been trying to very gently ask questions around the family, but it's almost like I've asked them cut off their arms! The question still remains though, how do 2nd cousins drop to 5-8th cousins?
If this woman had initially come up as a 5-8th cousin claiming to have the same gr-grandfather as me, I would have said look lady, go back and do some more research! The fact that Ancestry placed us at 2nd cousins when the results were in, then downgraded her to a distant cousin less than a year later tells me that it is a glitch or a malfunction somewhere. I've been looking for answers for nearly 2 years and for Ancestry to admit to a glitch or malfunction would be horrible publicity for them. I get it! In this modern age of technology, glitches happen right? Anyway, I am getting retested and Dawn is also getting retest. Seems Ancestry.com and Ancestry.ca, although same company, have different decisions on what constitutes grounds to be retested!
Clarification is a blessing. Thank you so much for your unending informational videos.
Hi Ramona, we are happy that you find these videos so useful to your research.
Thanks for the video. Now I understand how this works and how it affects my matches more clearly, I've ordered a kit.
Oh wow.....interesting! I was wondering about this.....saw some inter related relatives but there page doesn't indicate we share DNA. Thanks for this info....helps me understand more clearly.
I still don’t understand why a tree linked to dna has to be public to be included in to ‘ circles’. Private trees can include masses of information I.e. names, place, date of birth, parents, siblings.
Because the nature of DNA Circles is that it exposes information in your tree to others in the circle. If you have decided that you want your tree to be private, we assume it is because you do not want the information in your tree shared with others.
Ancestry thank you for your reply. My tree is public.
One issue with the DNA Circles that may be a not-so-common issue, but one that I ran into, is that people in the circles may not have a DNA connection to the Ancestor of the circle.
Within the circles, you are either in the circle by yourself or you're in a group within the circle. I believe the groupings are based off of a common ancestor in your family trees (who also descends from the ancestor of the circle), and also because you share DNA (the latter I can't confirm).... Anyway, I'm in a grouping with a few "2nd cousins" in our common ancestor's circle.... but what the Circle doesn't know, is that my grandfather had an affair with my grandmother's brother's wife, and the two people that I'm grouped with, are the progeny of my dad's half sibling who in-turn was the result of the affair.
Based on the genealogy (family trees) these people in my grouping are my 2nd cousins, and we're grouped together under the name of our common great-grandfather. In this particular case, my group is connected to our common ancestor genealogically speaking, my grandmother's and their grandfather's great grandparents' circles... BUT, in reality since they are the genetic grandchildren of my grandfather, they have no direct DNA connection to anybody in the circles except to me... but, because we are part of the same group, and because our family trees have the same GG-Grandfather, AND because I'm a DNA match to everybody in my group and to everybody in the circle (It's not a huge circle), the result is they are part of a circle where they have no DNA matches (except one, me)... This loophole was giving the two others in my group a false match to the circle.... or at the very least, the concept of the circle isn't explained well enough anywhere.
It's a touchy situation... and as a few of my newly minted half-cousins (formerly 2nd cousins) and I have looked into the family rumors, we almost stopped looking into the details because we kept showing up in the circles together and we all independently assumed that meant that the DNA was proving we all descended from the ancestor.
BUT, since these 2nd cousins had so much DNA in common with me (quite a bit higher than any of my other 2nd cousins) I kept looking at the cousin matches that I have with these 2nd cousins. I noticed that they were matching up with people on my grandfather's side that they had no business matching with.... so I went back to the DNA circles, and noticed that when I clicked on anybody else in the circle and clicked on DNA matches, these two cousins of mine weren't in common... in this case the DNA Circles really muddied the waters.
Wow! That is quite the family situation. I can tell you that DNA Circles are still in beta and we are looking at some ways to improve them. Thank you for this specific use case. I will pass it along. (~Crista)
My youngest daughter and I am a DNA match to my 2nd cousin but my eldest daughter is not. Strange how the DNA is dished out.
I am having problem. Connecting a match to the person in my tree. I watched your video on this subject. I think I know what is happening my ex sister in law attach my nephew to her tree. But I cannot attach him to my tree, how do I connect in this situation??
Crista, thank you for this presentation. I do have a question, does chemotherapy and/or radiation treatments effect the DNA results? This is if someone is currently having treatments.
Current treatments should not affect that sample.
Took my test 2 weeks ago.. Now, I wait....
A lapel mic would do you a great service if you are doing more vids. Audio on this is hearable, but pretty bad.Thanks for the info too.
Thanks for the suggestion, Kerry.
My Dad isn’t showing up for myself or my brother, so my Uncle is taking it . Hopefully this will get solved and yes he is 110 percent my Dad .
What do you mean when you say that your dad "isn't showing up?" Has he also taken the AncestryDNA test?
@@CristaCowan yes
@@CristaCowan might be his cancer treatment
@@theresasampson4263 Did he have a bone marrow transplant? That is the only type of cancer treatment that would cause a change of DNA.
👀
I prefer using Family Search, it's totally free and you can find more there.
I had my friend tested and I compared her DNA to mine on GEDmatch and it predicted that we are 7th cousins, but ancestrydna DNA doesn't have her on my list.
Ancestry only shows DNA matches down to 6 centimorgans of shared DNA.
We share 7.2cm
Leah Banks I love Gedmatch
I thought about it for years, seeing how many of the elders of my family passed away through the years and due to distance between us I was not able to ask them more about my ancestry, and questions were left unanswered, all I know is my grandparents and great grandfather who migrated from France to Peru, will Ancestry work for me to find out more about family members?
Hi, David. Thanks for reaching out. We're excited to hear of your interest in researching your family history. We think there may be some things you can find on Ancestry. The best way to know is to try a free trial for the World Explorer subscription. We have an article that will explain how our free trials work. After reading the article, please let us know if you have any questions.
support.ancestry.com/s/article/Ancestry-Free-Trial?language=en_US
I am a member and want to have my 90 year old aunt tested. She will not be building a tree herself and doesn’t want to pay monthly membership fees but I want access to her information how do I as her niece set this up? Extremely helpful video!
Information about how to handle your aunt's DNA test can be found here: th-cam.com/video/5aFWNSLqZ04/w-d-xo.html
One thing I’ve started to notice lately by chance is that cousin (1) doesn’t show up in match list with another cousin (2). However if I go to that missing cousin (2) and look at matches, the other cousin (1) is there as a match. So same 2 cousins. One match list shows match, the other doesn’t.
2nd issue. A person doesn’t show up in match list. I search for the person in member directory. The person is a match.
The Ancestry match lists are not showing all matches in each view. I will submit as issue but wanted to put it out there in case good explanation since Ancestry doesn’t respond to issue submissions.
1) If you check the "Removed Matches" folder of the one cousin, do you find the other in there?
2) How are you determining someone "doesn't show up in match list?"
How do I cancel my upgrade in a subscription not the subscription just the upgrade?
Then it's completely normal for half brothers who share same mother to come up 3rd Cousins?
No. Half-siblings will be listed as "Close Family" and they will share between 1435-2083 centimorgans of DNA. How much DNA do these two individuals share?
I have the same issue... my supposed only full blooded brother doesn’t come up but when I search him it comes up at 3rd to 4th cousin
Crista you did a video and you were matching fruit to explain DNA. Can you please advise the name of this video?
This was very helpful. Thank you.
If I upload my DNA test will I still connect with family members on here
Hi Della, thank you for the question. Ancestry is not set up to upload DNA tests from other companies. If you are interested in taking advantage of the features of AncestryDNA you are welcome to participate in AncestryDNA. You can purchase a test directly from us by heading over to www.ancestry.com/dna/
Because some of us don't have that much information on our families
Please make caption available for the Hearing Impaired. Thank you.
Hi there Charlotte, thanks so much for stopping by with this great request! We've raised this with the relevant team, and hope to soon be able to offer this on future videos. Thank you sincerely for bring this to our attention! 🌱❤️
Greetings from Cambodia. I see this video is at least 4 years old, but I'm hoping you might entertain a question. Here goes: I found out this week, my paternal aunt is not the biological daughter of my grandfather. My cousin's and I would like to know who my aunt's father was.
My grandmother would have been 20 when she became pregnant around Valentine's Day 1935 with her third child. She already had 2 children (my father and eldest aunt) when this baby was born. A piece I got from Ancestry DNA that's curious to me is that I received notification of a 2ND-3RD COUSIN DNA MATCH on my paternal grandmother's side that indicates in our family trees that this DNA match and I would be 5th cousins. This seems like a stretch to me is leading me to believe we are a closer DNA match than 5th cousins. I'm wondering if my aunt's father was actually my DNA 2nd-3rd cousin DNA match's 35 year-old Great Grandfather might possibly have impregnated my 20-year-old Grandmother. Could I be on the right track?
Hi, Kim. Thanks for getting in touch. We can certainly understand why you'd want to find this information. Wow, this seems like a bit of a complicated situation. We are only able to determine how much DNA is shared with matches. If you have a match that is determined to be a 5th cousin, that is what we'd suppose. It seems that you may have to do a bit more to find the information you're looking for. Maybe a paper trail of some sort. We hope you can find those answers you're looking for. We have an article that you may find helpful.
support.ancestry.com/s/article/Making-the-Most-of-AncestryDNA-Matches?language=en_US
@@AncestryUS Thank you very much for your quick response. I'll take a look at that. Best wishes.
That's no problem at all, Kim. We wish you all the very best as you navigate your family history and trust that you will call on us anytime you need our support. You may also find this guide to different DNA match categories of interest as it can really help you make better sense of how you and a genetic match are connected in a familial sense: support.ancestry.com/s/global-search/cat?language=en_US . We wish you every success and hope to see you back on site researching sometime soon.🌳
Can a person who shares your dna like your parent not come up in your matches ? Thank you.
Oh and a 3rd issue discovered through collaboration with a cousin. My match list doesn’t show her as match to another cousin. However her match list does shows connection to that cousin and she sees me as match in her list. Why doe my match list not show the match but hers does? This is not helpful and means we are missing possible matches.
Are you talking about Shared Matches between you and your cousin? This view only shows 4th cousins and closer (as determined by the amount of shared DNA). If the person does not share enough DNA with you to be a 4th cousin they will not show up on your Shared Matches list with her. If they share enough DNA with her to be estimated as a 4th cousin, the match would show up on the Shared Matches with you from her view.
Thank you for clearing up a few questions.
Great informative video, thank Thank you.
Very informative. Thank you.
You said that testing a sibling will catch about 87% of the DNA that I didn't inherit. Is it correct, then, to say that if enough siblings are tested, all my parents' DNA will have been collected?
That is correct. My science team tells me that a couple needs to have a minimum of 5 children in order for 100% of their DNA to be passed on to the next generation.
Ancestry Thank you. Very cool stuff.
My 5 siblings and I have been tested and we match as expected, full siblings! Unfortunately our parents are long deceased but we have a paternal aunt and a maternal aunt who have been tested. I also have a 1st cousin match from each side, and several paternal and maternal 2nd cousin matches. I am interested in learning how I can use these results to differentiate which segments my siblings and I inherited from our mother and which we inherited from our father. What resources would you recommend that I study?
You can use the SHARED MATCHES feature to sort out your maternal versus paternal matches. So, for example on your DNA match list, click on View Match with your paternal aunt. Then click on Shared Matches. Every match you have in common with her, likely came from your father's side of the family. Go through each of them and put a note in that they are a paternal match. Then do the same with your maternal aunt.
Now, you have a basic place to start figuring out where they fit into the family tree. Does that make sense.
I have definitely noticed there are people my dad is related to but I am not!
Hi Crista. Got my dna and my mom and Dads...curiously my dna doesn’t seem to fit my parents...I was hoping you could explain. My mom is 63% Great Britain. My dad 56% European South and 41% European East.... Only 39% of my dna belongs to my mom, 53% to my dad. Now...I have 20% European west in my dna...there is only 1% European west in both my mom and Dads test. How can I have 20% if combined my parents have only 2%??So....please explain. This has left me very confused.
Thanks so much for this video!! I found it very informative and helpful. I hope questions are permitted here. I plan to get an Ancestry DNA test done before the end of the year regardless of how you answer. Here is my situation: Based on family reports and on the marriage record from one of her sons, one of my great-grandmothers was probably a Robinson, but the only document I find listing her maiden name--her marriage record--says Alice M. Cowan. I think she may be the sister to Charles Robinson who married my great-grandfather's half-sister, Hester; because he lived in the same township where she was married, and because the census records show that he has a sister Alice about the right age. If my great-grandmother Alice M. ____ is the sister of Charles Robinson, would I be able to see a clear difference in the level of my DNA relationship to the descendants of the Charles-Hester line (double third cousin--or more precisely 1.5X) as compared with the descendants of my great-grandfather's other half siblings (half third cousins??). I know I can go back and review the video and check to see how those bars might overlap, and I will do that right away, but I promise I will be thrilled to receive an answer to this question.
how do i add adopted cousins or siblings ?
I find this so interesting. I do not know much about my mom's side. But I know alot about my dads so I have always wondered if I could find so of my maternal side this way. She does not want to be tested and she will not tell me why. I know that she did not have a very good childhood.
Crista, it would be so helpful if you could do a video on how to help plugin a new person from an Ancestry DNA Circle Discoveries into our Trees. I have spent hours trying to figure out where some of these people may fit in just to come up with nothing. Further more, it doesn't seem to make sense, if these people are Great (+) Grandparents, their birth dates imply a timeline that there isn't openings so I am extremely confused.
New Ancestor Discoveries are simply letting you know that there is a group of your DNA matches who all descend from a common ancestor. It doesn't mean that person is your ancestor (though they could be). They could also be a spouse (or the parents of a spouse) of a great-great-aunt (or some other type of tangential relationship). This is one of the (many) reasons why it is important to also trace all of the children and grandchildren of your ancestors.
Sorry I see that I wasn't clear. I was actually talking about DNA Circles; New Ancestor Discoveries. I printed all of mine out because I have been trying to map them out. Are they Grandparents? I was able to prove three people were Great Grandparents.
I’ve got a 920cm match with 13% dna possibly a 1st cousin, a genealogists told me she is matched to me on my mother’s side but my mum and grandad have done ancestry test and this 1st cousin doesn’t share an matches with my mum or grandad, is my genealogist correct or is this cousin related on my dads side ?
Also I’ve just had a 20% dna 1368cm I don’t know why it’s so hard to figure this out.
I am looking for my father
It would be helpful if you linked to other videos you reference.
I have looked for days to find DNA Ancestors. My results came in and gave me possibilities only. If you can please explain how people put a photo of "DNA Ancestor" in their tree? I have nothing, unless I am very unlucky or stupid. I am not being critical of this company. I am so very frustrated seeing others finding a real DNA Match and talk about their DNA ancestors. I only see "Shared Surnames".
If I am reading my results wrong or not going to the correct part of my results, please help me.
Hi Sherrell. I understand how the process of learning how to work with your AncestryDNA results can be a little overwhelming. But, you've got this. I'm here to help.
First thing to understand is this: If they show up on your AncestryDNA Match list (especially if they are a 4th cousin or closer) they are definitely related to you. So, let's start with the first person on your list. How much DNA do you share with them? (To find that out, click VIEW MATCH with that person. Then click the little "i" in the circle next to the confidence level.
Thank you. very helpful!
My grandpa last name was Kerr too..!
My sons dna matched my first cousins on my father side. Irish, Scottish, English. Does that mean I will definitely have that too?
Every person has a different ethnicity admixture. Since your son and your 1st cousin only share about 6% of their DNA, it is not guaranteed that you will have the same ethnicity admixture. Your son got 50% of his DNA from his father. Your cousin got 50% of their DNA from their other parent that is not related to you. The only way to know for sure what you inherited from each of your parents and which bits you passed on to your son, is for you to also test.
Hmm. Are there any benefits to testing an elderly individual as far as family matches go? Will it help link family if grandchildren/great grandchildren eventually take the test?
Yes. Always test the oldest living generation first. Each subsequent generation only gets half of that person's DNA. That means that there is half of their DNA that does not get passed to each child. Testing the oldest generation will also help you make connections to ancestors further back in time.
So what do I do if my parents took the test at my request but have forgotten their login info, so they don't know which DNA test results are who's. The dna map looks so similar I can't tell them apart?
It shows my mom attached to my dad on my family tree.
So, you think they may have mislabeled their tests? The easiest way to tell them apart is to look at the Shared Matches you have with each of them. Then, look at the family trees for each of those matches and match it up with what you know about your parents' ancestry.
Ancestry they don't have a tree or an account, so how would I see who they connect to?
From YOUR DNA Match list, click on your match with one of your parents and then click Shared Matches. That will show you which DNA Matches you have in common with that parent. Based on the family trees of those matches, you should be able to figure out which side of the family that person is connected to. That will tell you if your parents mixed up the labeling of their test results or not.
I recommend you to reset their passwords and then link them up to your tree. Since they did the test at your request, hopefully they will let you manage and then take care of their tests going forward.
I have a lock of hair that I strongly believe is from my maternal grandmother who has been dead 88 years. Could this be DNA tested? Is it ethical?
Hi Steve and thanks for getting in touch. We're afraid we can only accept saliva samples from living people. We're sorry for any disappointment this might cause.
I am having an interesting issue with one of my husband's dna matches. He shows up as a likely 2 or 3rd cousin with 319 CMs. He shares a number of my husband other matches, including many of those we have confirmed with shared ancestors as 2nd to 4th cousins.
They are all on my husband's mother's line. They are not only coming from my husband's maternal grandmother's line (Shaw & Mayberrry) , but also from my husband's maternal grandfather's mother's line (Barker & Youst). But, he does not share the matches that come down from my husband's maternal grandfather's father's line (Wallace & Tygard). But, based on your presentation, perhaps he just didn't get any of that dna.
I am beginning to think that on of this young man's parents is the child of one of my husband's aunts or uncle that are his mom's siblings, or he is the child of one of my husband's cousins from that same line.
The problem is that he has a tree and there is no indication that he was adopted. His parents, grandparents on both sides, and great grandparents are in no way connected to my husband's mom's highly documented line. No similar surnames and no similar locations at any time in their lives.
I sent him one message when he first showed up, commenting that it appeared he had some step parents listed as parents (different surnames). He removed the step parents, put parents with the same surname, said thank you, and then stopped responding to my question.
He even matches my husband's next highest dna match, a known 2nd cousin one time removed that my husband actually met when he was a child. He also matches my husband's 3rd cousin, that is the daughter of that 2nd cousin one time removed.
My point is that I am positive that I have my husband's ancestors correctly listed in our tree on his mom's side. My husband is definitely not adopted. But, this young man on my husband's list either is adopted or has an adopted parent or has an unknown parental event.
I want to help him, but he currently doesn't seem to want any help.
I have created a mirror tree, not attached to my own, but as a free floating branch on my main tree page. It was my way of confirming that there are no shared relatives and no shared locations.
Any suggestions on additional ways I might work this out without his help? It is really driving me nuts.
Char
Char - There are a lot of people who do not know that they are adopted or that there is a mis-attributed parentage event in their family tree. You state that this individual shares matches with both of your husband's grandparents. That, and the fact that he shares 319 cM with your husband, leads me to believe that he is a either a 1st cousin 1x removed or a 1st cousin 2x removed. Meaning he is the grandchild or great-grandchild of one of your husband's maternal aunts or uncles. Do you know the age of this individual?
I don't know his age but his parents were born in the early 1950's.
I realize this isn't the best way to approach this, since he has not asked for my help and has not even acknowledge my input. Just thought I would get ahead of this, because that is my nature. I agree with your assessment.
I probably shouldn't have posted the question since I only have one side of this. Just that the video gave me some ideas and I wanted to put it down clearly.
Char
So, given the testing of enough descendants, one could reverse engineer the dna of Deceased ancestors? Could one then identify their likely physical characteristics and likely ethnic background based on their genes much like ancestry dna does for the living in the tests?
Great question. And, the answer is yes. It is possible. Here is some work AncestryDNA science team did a few years ago to test the theory.
blogs.ancestry.com/ancestry/2014/12/16/ancestrydna-achieves-scientific-advancement-in-human-genome-reconstruction/
Hey all..I'm trying to figure out a mystery..I have my grandmother and mothers DNA..then me..my mom passed but why would my mother have cousins and my grandmother but there are BIG differences in level of cousin..for Instance..my mom and my grandmother are related to several cousins that are Whitaker's..but most are 4th cousin toy grandmother and 2nd cousin to my mom...inbreeding? It's kinda scary cause my grandmother won't say who my grandfather is..and I'm tripping out in how I can be closer to some of these cousins than her..
Focus less on the predicted relationship and more on the shared centimorgans (amount of shared DNA between the matches). So, for example, how many centimorgans of DNA do you share with one of these matches versus how much your mom shares with that same match and how much your grandma shares with that same match.
Does that make sense?
Hi Christa, Just watched this great video, "You Won't Match Everyone You are Related To" which was just published, Oct. 2017. You had mentioned that when you go beyond 2nd cousin, you might not match all of your cousins. I have a situation where I didn't match either my 5th cousin, or her Aunt. I realized Ancestry only post matches 6 centimorgans, and above. I did take my DNA and uploaded it to Gedmatch. I did show a match, but with 4+ to 5 centimorgans on two chromosomes. I was wondering why? Does that mean we are still 4th to 5th cousins?
You can still be a 4th or 5th cousin to someone and not share any significant amount of DNA.
I would like to go another step further to my post and your reply. None of the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th cousins of my 4th to 5th cousin and her Aunt do not show up in my matches. Does that mean we still can be 4th to 5th cousins? Thanks.
Are those 1st-4th cousins of that 4th cousin match supposed to be connected to you through the same set of common ancestors?
Yes they are. Also, another point in all of this, is all of my known 3rd cousin matches to me (we have common great-great grandparents) that Ancestry says that they are Distant or 5th to 8th cousins with very low centimorgans. Does this mean that a lot of DNA was lost randomly through the generations?
Look at the amounts of Shared DNA (you can do this by clicking on the little "i" in the circle next to the confidence level on the VIEW MATCH page. Known 3rd cousins will, typically, share an average of 90 cM of DNA (but, it can be as low as 0).
Very helpful. I've been looking at this stuff so much, I saw your Shipman, and thought, "Ooo. I wonder if that connects to my Shipman..." :)
Who is your Shipman?
Amanda Shipman born in Arkansas 1857, and married a Sumner. She was married in Arkansas, to a Sumner, and then moved to Oklahoma. I don't have much on her.
I don't have an Amanda Shipman, born in Arkansas in 1857. But, we may be able to figure out the connection if you ever find her parents/grandparents.
I don't want to be in a dna circle ... how do I remove myself from it?? Please
DNA Circles are automatically created when you have a group of DNA Matches who all have the same ancestor in their public family tree. To remove yourself from a DNA Circle you can make your family tree private.
What about when some one had 3rd great grandparents were first cousins and the 4th great grandparents were first cousins to?
How will the DNA work when this happen
If your parents were 1st cousins, you would notice an increase in the amount of shared DNA between you and your other close family members. But, at that distance (3rd and 4th great-grandparents) it is unlikely to have much of an effect at all.
Hello Ancestry. Our ancestry changed his surname from the one before. We know both surnames. With your professional researchers, can you guys find all that share the same dna but different surnames?
If you are interested in getting a quote from ProGenealogists to hire them for this type of research, you can reach them here: www.progenealogists.com
We have just received the test results and matches for one of my wife's 2nd cousins (or rather that is the relationship that we have in the tree). Ancestry shows no match between them, and there are no common matches. My wife's '2nd cousin' does match as expected with his 1st cousin. My wife doesn't match his 1st cousin, and again there are no common matches. My wife's Ancestry test was done a few years ago, and her '2nd cousin's test was very recent. I know that there have been changes to the testing during that period. Would there be any merit in retesting my wife using the latest test, or should we simply accept that there is no biological relationship and now try to work out where the biological tree diverts from the accepted family tree? There are some weak common matches on GedMatch between my wife and her '2nd cousin', but no shared DNA.
If you wife does not match her 2nd cousin there is likely a biological break in the tree. Rather than testing your wife again, I would recommend testing other of her family members. For example, if you test one of her siblings, you will be able to tell if they are full or half siblings. If their results come back indicating that they are full siblings, then test a first cousin on that side of the family tree to see if the break is at the parent/grandparent level.
Many thanks. I think that I have now resolved the mystery, through use of the tools at GedMatch and the charts at The Genetic Genealogist website. I think that the relationships are half-1C and half-2C. There is evidence in the birth records that also support this. By setting the thresholds very low in GedMatch 1-1 test, I found a small DNA match between my wife and her 'second cousin'. The total length of matching DNA would support a half-2C relationship. By the way, it would be really helpful if the Ancestry site provided more visibility of the chromosome segment matches. The 'Amount of Shared DNA' info is valuable, but more detail would be a really big improvement.
How does the family tree work? I thought ancestry does it. It's complicated for me because I don't really know my family 😭
Hey Daniel Han. Thanks for checking out this video from deep in our archives. We're delighted to see your interest in broadening your knowledge of your family history and building a tree to be proud of. We recognize that this is not always easy but can assure you that we're here to accompany you as you strive to achieve your goals.
It is essential to note that Ancestry does not build the family trees that appear on our website. Each family tree is constructed and owned by the member who created it. Our website is a self service resource which provides the perfect home for all those seeking to realize their own research goals and our subscriptions unlock access to our vault of historical records, public family tree database as well as a host of other innovative research tools. Click here to learn more about these features : support.ancestry.com/s/article/What-to-do-with-an-Ancestry-Membership?language=en_US. Rest assured that we have significant resources available to assist you and would first suggest checking out this guide from our dedicated support center which should have you researching like a pro in no time support.ancestry.com/s/article/Getting-Started-Lesson-1-Starting-Your-Tree . Once you've entered the information you do know then our tools such as Hints wil lstart to assist you with worthy suggestions for you to review and add to your tree if relevant.
We hope this gives some clarity but please stop by and see us again anytime you need our assistance. Best of luck on behalf of all our team! 🌳
My DNA matches everyone on all of my branches going back to the early 1600's and late 1500's except for my fathers mother's line, which is Irish Potato Famine Irish, I know three of my Irish Great Grandparents, one male and two females, I have their parent's names, but I can't find anything in County Cork or the Munster area for them. They all left Ireland prior to 1860.
I am happy with my results and it was fun
I have a 5th cousin that I am not a DNA match with and yet my husband shares 8 cM with my 5 th cousin.
I have an uncle under close family-His niece is my 1rst cousin. I'm adopted and we have connected. Her mom would be my aunt. Does this mean my aunt and uncle's sibling , a male would be my Birthfather?
It means their full sibling would be your birth father or birth mother, yes.
I can't get any of my known relatives to test. They don't seem interested.
Have you explained to them how having their test results will help your family history research? They may not be interested in the results but if they know how beneficial that information would be in helping your research efforts, maybe they'd reconsider.
Offer to pay.
Crista, I found the "i" and could read the centiMorgans.
Excellent video! I share 762 cm with a girl, and according to ancestry she's like my 1 to 2 cousin, are there any other possibilities?
How would cousin marriages or siblings marrying another set of siblings skew the results?
When a set of siblings from one family marries a set of siblings from another family, their children are double first cousins. That means that they share double the amount of DNA as regular first cousins. Assuming no more intermarriage between the two families, the amount of shared DNA between succeeding generations will be double what is expected.
I was adopted, I know my bio mother but not my father. Is it possible to find him or his relatives through DNA testing?
It is possible. When you take an AncestryDNA test, we compare your DNA to the other 7 million people who have taken the test and show you a list of people you share DNA with. If someone is your 2nd cousin, for example, one of their parents would be the 1st cousin of one of your parents. Using this information, you can contact them and find out who in their family could possibly be your biological father.
Is it normal that I'm not assigned to any genetic community?
Yes. Not everyone has a Genetic Community. But, as more people test, more genetic communities are created. So, check back.
@@AncestryUS Thank you :)
Just ordered the test and am about to spit. For me, I am adopted and it was closed so I don't know ANYTHING about my biological parents or family. Is this going to be a problem since I can't make a tree?
No problem at all. In fact, you will get a DNA Match List that very likely could lead to the identity of your biological parents. So, you may have a family tree sooner than you think.
LOL @ 72 first cousins! Makes me feel quite deprived with my total of 3 (Mum was an only child - Dad only had one brother)
boi I have 25, I think
I'm late to this video (very informative!), but I'm hoping you can help. I was messaged on Ancestry.com by a young man looking for his birth father. We share 441 cM across 22 segments. My question is, if he shares more cM/segments with my brother, is it likelier that the match would be on my dad's side of the family? And is that at dad's 1st cousin level(as per answer to another question here)? Unfortunately, only 1(maternal) uncle has tested.
I want to help this man, but I come from a huge extended family, & trying to figure this out is making me crazy!
It’s I used this for the first time, I have a lot of white relatives on my dna ancestry match list.
my dads cousins kids did not show up on mine
How many people have you got DNA tested in your family
Hi Max - I have DNA tested both of my parents, one of my grandparents (the rest were deceased before testing became available), two of my dad's siblings, my mom's siblings, and 1st cousins of each of my parents from both sides of their trees.
What if your biological brother has zero matches with you . In fact, he has very few matches at all to anyone. I think he's not my real brother and it was a baby switch at the hospital. My mother was a former novice in a Benedictine convent so I don't think it could be anything else.
Ancestry says my dad and I are definitely related but he has matches that I don’t!
That's because you only got half of his DNA. There is a whole other half of his DNA that you did not get. So, he will match people on that half that you won't.
Ancestry yes I know! Finding that out and researching centimorgans is why I watched this video and sent it to a distant cousin!
Ancestry I don’t know much about DNA but I believe the splitting of DNA is the Creators way of continuing life on this earth without the same genetics crossing and causing defects!
@@AncestryUSDNA is fascinating lol.
Hello, this video was great. I have a second cousin who shows up as a match at 303 centimorgans, on 16 segments. Her daughter, also shows up as my second cousin, at 301 centimorgans, on 18 segments. My second cousins husband, shows as my 3rd cousin, with 123 centimorgans, across 6 segments. I understand that I am related on both sides, but how are the mother and daughter my second cousins, with almost equal centimorgans?
If you are related to both of her parents, she will share more DNA with you.
I understand, but both mother and daughter are listed as direct second cousins. I thought the daughter would be a 2nd cousin 1x removed, but she isn't. So how do I list in the tree? Is the daughter a 2nd cousin 1x removed by default?
Daughter is a 2nd cousin 1x removed on her mother's side and a 3rd cousin 1x removed on her father's side (if I understood your original post correctly). That means that she will share 0-236 centimorgans with you that she inherited from her mom and 0-114 cM that she inherited from her dad. The computer that assigns people to a category of relationship on your DNA match list does not know how she is related or where she fits in your family tree. All it knows is that she shares XX amount of DNA with you and that, based on the law of averages, she might be a 2nd cousin.
When you enter her into your tree, with the correct relationships on both her father's side and mother's side, she will be where she belongs.
Does that make sense?
It does. This is fascinating. Thank you much.
Ancestry gives a range of possibilities in addition to the predicted second cousin relationship with the mom. It also suggests a 1st cousin 1x removed. So if the father is a 3rd cousin and the mother is a 1 cousin 1x removed, would that make the daughter a 2nd cousin, nothing removed?
why does dna on my mother side shows everyone an my father side shows nothing
Everyone gets 50% of their DNA from their father and 50% from their mother.
What are you seeing that leads you to believe that you only are seeing DNA from your mother?
It’s like I find relatives on my mothers side, but I can’t find any on my fathers side.
Hi Mannie, Has your mother or someone from her side of the family that you know taken the AncestryDNA test? If so, you can use the SHARED MATCHES feature with that person to create a custom group with all of your maternal matches. Then, whatever is left on your main match list is likely from your father's side. Does that help?
@@AncestryUS My Mother took the dna ancestry.
Excellent! Look down the right-hand side of the page. Some of your matches should say "Mother's Side." How many centimorgans of DNA do you share with the top person on your list that does NOT say "mother's side?"
My tree is on Familysearch and Wikitree. What company shouldI use and how do I enter the info into FS and WT?
Can you share zero DNA with second cousin twice removed??
Hi, Paranormal. Thanks for asking that great question. A second cousin twice removed would share around the same amount of DNA as a 3rd-4th cousin match. We know it can be puzzling when you can't see matches that seem like they should be on your list. DNA passes down randomly, you get 50% of your DNA from each parent. That means there is 50% of both parent's DNA that you did not get. Because of that, sometimes you may have a cousin, maybe a 3rd or 4th cousin who will not show up on your match list. They may have not inherited enough DNA in common to be matched. Please let us know if you have other questions.
@@AncestryUS thank you so much your reply. Much appreciated. I have read your comment with interest. And I completely understand where your coming from. So thank you so much for this information. Also another question I wanted to ask is. So my mother and I gedmatched this suppose 2C2R who is in our family tree. His end is kosher. However he shares a zero DNA with me and my mother. I've questioned whether or not something may of happened the down the line. However many others have said it is definitely possible for a 2CTR to share zero DNA due to the random inheritance. Also I wanted to ask. If a adoption occurred before 1927 could a random woman put her name on the Birth certificate as the child's mother. And no one would know? Or would the mother have to be biological to register herself as the birth parent.
Any information would be highly appreciated.
Kind regards.
Thanks very much for getting back in touch! We here at Ancestry Social Support are not researchers, so we wouldn't be qualified to provide research assistance, however, Crista has another great video when it comes to genealogical research and adoption that could provide a few tips to you: th-cam.com/video/bemP0LQ4lik/w-d-xo.html
Additionally, a good option for you to verify this relationship could be for this cousin to share their DNA test with you on Ancestry, so you can see if you have any matches in common. If you can find DNA Matches in their match list that you and/or your mom have, this suggests that this match and you are indeed related but don't show as matches due to what you've each inherited.
We hope this information helps a little further, and we wish you all the best in your continued research!
Can you share zero DNA with second cousin once removed??
Crista, as a matter of interest, do you have photos for ALL of your great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents, but just choose not to upload some? Or have you simply not been able to locate photos for a few of them? Congrats on the John O'Brien brick wall, BTW!
I haven't located photos for them. Yet! ;-)