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AutoSegment Triangulation Cluster Tool at GEDmatch

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Today, I’m reviewing the exciting new AutoSegment Triangulation Cluster Tool at GEDmatch. I love it because this automated tool can be as easy or complex as you want.

It’s easy because you just select your options, run it, and presto, you receive all kinds of useful results. It’s only complex if you want to understand the details of what’s really happening beneath the hood, or you have a complex problem to unravel. The great news is that this one tool does both.

I’ve taken a deep dive with this article so that you can use AutoSegment either way.

Evert-Jan “EJ” Blom, creator of Genetic Affairs has partnered with GEDmatch to provide AutoSegment for GEDmatch users. He has also taken the time to be sure I’ve presented things correctly in this article. Thanks, EJ!

My recommendation is to read this article by itself first to understand the possibilities and think about how you can utilize these results. Then, at GEDmatch, select the AutoSegment Report option and see what treasures await!

Genetic Affairs

Genetic Affairs offers a wide variety of clustering tools that help genealogists break down their brick walls by showing us, visually, how our matches match us and each other. I’ve written several articles about Genetic Affairs’ tools and how to use them, here.

Every DNA segment that we have originated someplace. First, from one of our parents, then from one of our 4 grandparents, and so forth, on up our tree. The further back in time we go, the smaller the segments from those more distant ancestors become, until we have none for a specific ancestor, or at least none over the matching threshold.

The keyword in that sentence is segment, because we can assign or attribute DNA segments to ancestors. When we find that we match someone else on that same segment inherited from the same parent, assuming the match is identical by descent and not identical by chance, we then know that somehow, we shared a common ancestor. Either an ancestor we’ve already identified, or one that remains a mystery.

Those segments can and will reveal ancestors and tell us how we are related to our matches.

That’s the good news. The bad news is that not every vendor provides segment information. For example, 23andMe, FamilyTreeDNA, and MyHeritage all do, but Ancestry does not.

For Ancestry testers, and people wishing to share segment information with Ancestry testers, all is not lost.

Everyone can download a copy of their raw DNA data file and upload those files to vendors who accept uploads, including FamilyTreeDNA, MyHeritage, and of course GEDmatch.

GEDmatch

GEDmatch does not offer DNA testing services, specializing instead in being the common matching denominator and providing advanced tools. GEDmatch recently received a facelift. If you don’t recognize the image above, you probably haven’t signed in to GEDmatch recently, so take a look. The AutoSegment tool is only available on the new version, not the Classic version.

Ancestry customers, as well as people testing elsewhere, can download their DNA files from the testing vendor and upload the files to GEDmatch, availing themselves of both the free and Tier 1 subscription tools.

I’ve written easy step-by-step download/upload instructions for each vendor, here.

At GEDmatch, matching plus a dozen tools are free, but the Tier 1 plan for $10 per month provides users with another 14 advanced tools, including AutoSegment.

To get started, click on the AutoSegment option.

AutoSegment at GEDmatch

You’ll see the GEDmatch AutoSegment selection menu.

You can easily run as many AutoSegment reports as you want, so I suggest starting with the default values to get the lay of the land. Then experiment with different options.

At GEDmatch, AutoSegment utilizes your top 3000 matches. What a huge, HUGE timesaver.

Just a couple of notes about options.

  • My go-to number of SNPs is 500 (or larger,) and I’m always somewhat wary of matches below that level because there is an increased likelihood of identical by chance segments when the required number of segment matching locations is smaller.
  • GEDmatch has to equalize DNA files produced by different vendors, including no-calls where certain areas don’t read. Therefore, there are blank spaces in some files where there is data in other vendors’ files. The “Prevent Hard Breaks” option allows GEDmatch to “heal” those files by allowing longer stretches of “missing” DNA to be considered a match if the DNA on both sides of that blank space matches.
  • “Remove Segments in Known Pile-Up Regions” is an option that instructs GEDmatch NOT to show segments in parts of the human genome that are known to have pile-up regions. I generally don’t select this option, because I want to see those matches and determine for myself if they are valid. We’ll look at a few comparative examples in the Pileup section of this article.

Fortunately, you can experiment with each of these settings one by one to see how they affect your matching. Even if you don’t normally subscribe to GEDmatch, you can subscribe for only one month to experiment with this and other Tier 1 tools.

Your AutoSegment results will be delivered via a download link.

Save and Extract

All Genetic Affairs cluster files are delivered in a zipped file.

You MUST DO TWO THINGS, or these files won’t work correctly.

  1. Save the zip file to your computer.
  2. Extract the files from the zip file. If you’re on a PC, right-click on the zip file and EXTRACT ALL. This extracts the files from the zipped file to be used individually.

If you click on a feature and receive an error message, it’s probably because you either didn’t save the file to your computer or didn’t extract the files.

The file name is very long, so if you try to add the file to a folder that is also buried a few levels deep on your system, you may encounter problems when extracting your file. Putting the file on your desktop so you can access it easily while working is a good idea.

Now, let’s get to the good stuff.

Your AutoSegment Cluster File

Click on the largest HTML file in the list of your extracted files. The HTML file uses the files in the clusters and matches folders, so you don’t need to open those individually.

It’s fun to watch your clusters fly into place. I love this part.

If your file is too large and your system is experiencing difficulty or your browser locks, just click on the smaller AutoSegment HTML file, at the bottom of the list, which is the same information minus the pretty cluster.

Word to the wise – don’t get excited and skip over the three explanatory sections just below your cluster. Yes, I did that and had to go back and read to make sense of what I was seeing.

At the bottom of this explanatory section is a report about Pileup Regions that I’ll discuss at the end of this article.

Excel

As a third viewing option, you can also open the AutoSegment Excel file to view the results in an excel grid.

You’ll notice a second sheet at the bottom of this spreadsheet page that says AutoSegment-segment-clusters. If you click on that tab, you’ll see that your clusters are arranged in chromosome and cluster order, in the same format as long-time genetic genealogist Jim Bartlett uses in his very helpful blog, segment-ology.

You’ll probably see a message at the top of the spreadsheet asking if you want to enable editing. In order for the start and end locations to calculate, you must enable editing. If the start and end locations are zeroes, look for the editing question.

Notice that the colors on this sheet are coordinated with the clusters on the first sheet.

EJ uses yellow rows as cluster dividers. The “Seg” column in the yellow row indicates the number of people in this cluster group, meaning before the next yellow divider row. “Chr” is the chromosome. “Segment TG” is the triangulation group number and “Side” is Jim Bartlett’s segment tracking calculation number.

Of course, the Centimorgans column is the cM size, and the number of matching SNPs is provided.

You can read about how Jim Bartlett tracks his segment clusters, here, which includes discussions of the columns and how they are used.

Looking at each person in the cluster groups by chromosome, *WS matches me and *Cou, the other person in the cluster beginning and ending at the start and end location on chromosome 1. In the match row (as compared with the yellow dividing row,) Column F, “Seg,” tells you the number of segments where *WA matches me, the tester.

A “*” before the match name at GEDmatch means a pseudonym or alias is being used.

In order to be included in the AutoSegment report, a match must triangulate with you and at least one other person on (at least) one of those segments. However, in the individual match reports, shown below, all matching segments are provided – including ones NOT in segment clusters.

Individual DNA Matches

In the HTML file, click on *WA.

You’ll see the three segments where *WA matches you, or me in this case. *WA triangulates with you and at least one other person on at least one of these segments or *WA would not be included in the GEDmatch AutoSegment report.

However, *WA may only triangulate on one segment and simply match you on the other two – or *WA may triangulate on more than one segment. You’ll have to look at the other sections of this report to make that determination.

Also, remember that this report only includes your top 3000 matches.

AutoSegment

All Genetic Affairs tools begin with an AutoCluster which is a grouping of people who all match you and some of whom match each other in each colored cluster.

AutoSegment at GEDmatch begins with an AutoCluster as well, but with one VERY IMPORTANT difference.

AutoSegment clusters at GEDmatch represent triangulation of three people, you and two other people, in AT LEAST ONE LOCATION. Please note that you and they may also match in other locations where three people don’t triangulate.

By matching versus triangulation, I’m referring to the little individual cells which show the intersection of two of your matches to each other.

Regular AutoCluster reports, meaning NOT AutoSegment clusters at GEDmatch, include overlapping segment matches between people, even if they aren’t on the same chromosome and/or don’t overlap entirely. A colored cell in AutoSegment at GEDmatch means triangulation, while a colored cell in other types of AutoCluser reports means match, but not necessarily triangulation.

Match information certainly IS useful genealogically, but those two matching people in that cell:

  • Could be matching on unrelated chromosomes.
  • Could be matching due to different ancestors.
  • Could be matching each other due to an ancestor you don’t have.
  • May or may not triangulate.

Two people who have a colored cell intersection in an AutoSegment Cluster at GEDmatch are different because these cells don’t represent JUST a match, they represent a TRIANGULATED match.

Triangulation tightens up these matches by assuring that all three people, you and the two other people in that cell, match each other on a sufficient overlapping segment (10 cM in this case) on the same chromosome which increases the probability that you do in fact share a common ancestor.

I wrote about the concept of triangulation in my article about triangulation at GEDmatch, but AutoSegment offers a HUGE shortcut where much of the work is done for you. If you’re not familiar with triangulation, it’s still a good idea to read that article, along with A Triangulation Checklist Born From the Question; “Why NOT use Close Relatives for Triangulation?”

Let’s take a look at my AutoSegment report from GEDmatch.

AutoSegment Clusters at GEDmatch

A total of 195 matches are clustered into a total of 32 colored clusters. I’m only showing a portion of the clusters, above.

I’ve blurred the names of my matches in my AutoSegment AutoCluster, of course, but each cell represents the intersection of two people who both match and triangulate with me and each other. If the two people match and triangulate with each other and others in the same cluster, they are colored the same as their cluster matches.

For example, all 18 of the people in the orange cluster match me and each other on one (or more) chromosome segments. They all triangulate with me and at least one other person, or they would not appear in a colored cell in this report. They triangulate with me and every other person with whom they have a colored cell.

If you mouse over a colored cell, you can see the identity of those two people at that intersection and who else they match in common. Please note that me plus the two people in any cell do triangulate. However, me plus two people in a different cell in the same cluster may triangulate on a different segment. Everyone matches in an intricate grid, but different segments on different chromosomes may be involved.

You can see in this example that my cousin, Deb matches Laurene and both Deb and Laurene match these other people on a significant amount of DNA in that same cluster.

What happens when people match others within a cluster, but also match people in other colored clusters too?

Multiple Cluster Matches = Grey Cells

The grey cells indicate people who match in multiple clusters, showing the match intersection outside their major or “home” cluster. When you see a grey cell, think “AND.” That person matches everyone in the colored cell to the left of that grey cell, AND anyone in a colored cell below grey cells too. Any of your matches could match you and any number of other people in other cells/clusters as well. It’s your lucky day!

Deb’s matches are all shown in row 4. She and I both match all of the orange cluster people as well as several others in other clusters, indicated by grey cells.

I’m showing Deb’s grey cell that indicates that she also matches people in cluster #5, the large brown cluster. When I mouse over that grey cell, it shows that Deb (orange cluster) and Daniel (brown cluster) both match a significant number of people in both clusters. That means these clusters are somehow connected.

Looking at the bigger picture, without mousing over any particular cell, you can see that a nontrivial number of people match between the first several clusters. Each of these people match strongly within their primary-colored cluster, but also match in at least one additional cluster. Some people will match people in multiple clusters, which is a HUGE benefit when trying to identify the source ancestor of a specific segment.

Let’s look at a few examples. Remember, all of these people match you, so the grid shows how they also match with each other.

#1 – In the orange cluster, the top 5 rows, meaning the first 5 people on the left side list match other orange cluster members, but they ALSO match people in the brown cluster, below. A grey cell is placed in the column of the person they also match in the brown cluster.

#2 – The two grey cells bracketed in the second example match someone in the small red cluster above, but one person also matches someone in the small purple cluster and the other person matches someone in the brown cluster.

#3 – The third example shows one person who matches a number of people in the brown cluster in addition to every person in the magenta cluster below.

#4 – This long, bracketed group shows several people who match everyone in the orange cluster, some of whom also match people in the green cluster, the red cluster, the brown cluster, and the magenta cluster. Clearly, these clusters are somehow related to each other.

Always look at the two names involved in an individual cell and work from there.

The goal, of course, is to identify and associate these clusters with ancestors, or more specifically, ancestral couples, pushing back in time, as we identify the common ancestors of individuals in the cluster.

For example, the largest orange cluster represents my paternal grandparents. The smaller clusters that have shared members with the large orange cluster represent ancestors in that lineage.

Identifying the MRCA, or most recent common ancestor with our matches in any cluster tells us where those common segments of DNA originated.

Chromosome Segments from Clusters

As you scroll down below your cluster, you’ll notice a section that describes how you can utilize these results at DNAPainter.

While GEDmatch can’t automatically determine which of your matches are maternal and paternal, you can import them, by colored cluster, to DNAPainter where you can identify clusters to ancestors and paint them on your maternal and paternal chromosomes. I’ve written about how to use DNAPainter here.

Let’s scroll to the next section in your AutoSegment file.

Chromosome Segment Statistics

The next section of your file shows “Chromosome segment statistics per AutoSegment cluster.”

I need to take a minute here to describe the difference between:

  1. Colored clusters on your AutoCluster diagram, shown below, and
  2. Chromosome segment clusters or groups within each colored AutoSegment cluster

Remember, colored clusters are people, and you can match different people on different, sometimes multiple, chromosomes. Two people whose intersecting cell is colored triangulate on SOME segment but may also match on other segments that don’t triangulate with each other and you.

According to my “Chromosome segment statistics” report, my large orange AutoSegment cluster #1, above, includes:

  • 67 segments from all my matches
  • On five chromosomes (3, 5, 7, 10, 17)
  • That cluster into 8 separate chromosome segment clusters or groups within the orange cluster #1

This is much easier to visualize, so let’s take a look.

Chromosome Segment Clusters

Click on any cluster # in your report, above, to see the chromosome painting for that cluster. I’m clicking on my AutoSegment cluster #1 on the “Chromosome segment statistics” report that will reveal all of the segments in orange cluster #1 painted on my chromosomes.

The brightly colored painted segments show the triangulated segment locations on each chromosome. You can easily see the 8 different segment clusters in cluster #1.

Interestingly, three separate groups or chromosome clusters occur on chromosome 5. We’ll see in a few minutes that the segments in the third cluster on chromosome 5 overlaps with part of cluster #5. (Don’t confuse cluster number shown with a # and chromosome number. They are just coincidentally both 5 in this case.)

The next tool helps me visualize each of these segment clusters individually. Just scroll down.

You can mouse over the segment to view additional information, but I prefer the next tool because I can easily see how the DNA of the people who are included in this segment overlap with each other.

This view shows the individual chromosome clusters, or groups, contained entirely within the orange cluster #1. (Please note that you can adjust the column widths side to side by positioning the cursor at the edge of the column header and dragging.)

Fortunately, I recognize one of these matches, Deb, and I know exactly how she and I are related, and which ancestor we share – my great-grandparents.

Because these segments are triangulated, I know immediately that every one of these people share that segment with Deb and me because they inherited that segment of DNA from some common ancestor shared by me and Deb both.

To be very clear, these people may not share our exact same ancestor. They may share an ancestor upstream from Deb and my common ancestor. Regardless, these people, Deb, and I all share a segment I can assign at this point to my great-grandparents because it either came from them for everyone, or from an upstream ancestor who contributed it to one of my great-grandparents, who contributed it to me and Deb both.

Segment Clusters Entirely Linked

Clusters #2 and #3 are small and have common matches with people in cluster #1 as indicated by the grey cells, so let’s take a look.

I’m clicking on AutoSegment green cluster #2 which only has two cluster members.

I can see that the common triangulated segment between these two people and me occurs on chromosome 3.

This segment on chromosome 3 is entirely contained in green cluster #2, meaning no members of other clusters triangulate on this segment with me and these two people.

This can be a bit confusing, so let’s take it logically step by step.

Remember that the two people who triangulate in green cluster #2 also match people in orange cluster #1? However, the people from orange cluster #1 are NOT shown as members of green cluster #2.

This could mean that although the two people in the green cluster #2 match a couple of people in the orange cluster, they did not match the others, or they did not triangulate. This can be because of the minimum segment overlap threshold that is imposed.

So although there is a link between the people in the clusters, it is NOT sufficient for the green people to be included in the orange cluster and since the two matches triangulate on another segment, they become a separate green cluster.

In reality, you don’t need to understand exactly why members do or don’t fall into the clusters they do, you just need to understand generally how clustering and triangulation works. In essence, trust the tool if people are NOT included in multiple clusters. Click on each person individually to see which chromosomes they match you on, even if they don’t triangulate with others on all of those segments. At this point, I often run one-to-one matches, or other matching tools, to see exactly how people match me and each other.

However, if they ARE included in multiple partly linked clusters, that can be a HUGE bonus.

Let’s look at red cluster #3.

Segment Clusters Partly Linked

You can see that Mark, one of the members of red cluster #3 shares two triangulated segments, one on chromosome 4, and one on chromosome 10.

Mark and Glenn are members of cluster #3, but Glenn is not a member of the segment cluster/group on chromosome 4, only Iona and Mark.

Scrolling down, I can view additional information about the cluster members and the two segments that are held within red cluster #3.

Unlike green cluster #2 whose segment cluster/group is entirely confined to green cluster #2, red cluster #3 has NO segments entirely confined to members of red cluster #3.

Cluster #3 has two members, Mark and Glen. Mark and Glen, along with Val who is a member of orange cluster #1 triangulate on chromosome 10. Remember, I said that chromosome 10 would be important in a minute when we were discussing orange cluster #1. Now you know why.

This segment of chromosome 10 triangulates in both orange cluster #1 AND red cluster #3.

However, Mark, who is a red cluster #3 member also triangulates with Iona and me on a segment of chromosome 4. This segment also appears in AutoSegment brown cluster #4 on chromosome 4.

Now, the great news is that I know my earliest known ancestors with Iona, which means that I can assign this segment to my paternal great-great-grandparents.

If I can identify a common ancestor with some of these other people, I may be able to push segments back further in time to an earlier ancestral couple.

Identifying Common Ancestors

Of course, review each cluster’s members to see if you recognize any of your cousins.

If you don’t know anyone, how do you identify a common ancestor? You can email the person, of course, but GEDmatch also facilitates uploading GEDCOM files which are trees.

In your primary AutoSegment file, keep scrolling to see who has trees.

AutoSegment Cluster Information

If you continue to scroll down in your original HTML file, you’ll see AutoSegment Cluster Information.

For each cluster, all members are listed. It’s easy to see which people have uploaded trees. You can click to view and can hopefully identify an ancestor or at least a surname.

Click on “tree” to view your match’s entry, then on Pedigree to see their tree.

If your matches don’t have a tree, I suggest emailing and sharing what you do know. For example, I can tell my matches in cluster #1 that I know this line descends from Lazarus Estes and Elizabeth Vannoy, their birth and death dates and location, and encourage my match to view my tree which I have uploaded to GEDmatch.

If you happen to have a lot of matches with trees, you can create a tag group and run the AutoTree analysis on this tag group to identify common ancestors automatically. AutoTree is an amazing tool that identifies common ancestors in the trees of your matches, even if they aren’t in your tree. I wrote about AutoTree, here.

Pileup Regions

Whether you select “Remove Segments in Known Pileup Regions” or not when you select the options to run AutoSegment, you’ll receive a report that you can access by a link in the Explanation of AutoSegment Analysis section. The link is buried at the bottom of those paragraphs that I said not to skip, and many people don’t even see it. I didn’t at first, but it’s most certainly worth reviewing.

What Are Pileup Regions?

First, let’s talk about what pileup regions are, and why we observe them.

Some regions of the human genome are known to be more similar than others, for various reasons.

In these regions, people are more likely to match other people simply because we’re human – not specifically because we share a common ancestor.

EJ utilizes a list of pileup regions, based on the Li et al 2014 paper.

You may match other people on these fairly small segments because humans, generally, are more similar in these regions.

Many of those segments are too small to be considered a match by themselves, although if you happen to match on an adjacent segment, the pileup region could extend your match to appear to be more significant than it is.

If you select the “remove pileup segments” option, and you overlap any pileup region with 4.00 cM or larger, the entire matching segment that includes that region will be removed from the report no matter how large the matching segment is in total.

Here’s an example where the pileup region of 5.04 cM is right in the middle of a matching segment to someone. This entire 15.04 cM segment will be removed.

If those end segments are both 10 cM each instead of 5 cM, the segment will still be removed.

However, if the segment overlap with the pileup region is 3.99 cM or smaller, none of the resulting segment will be removed, so long as the entire segment is over the matching threshold in the first place. In the example above, if the AutoSegment threshold was 7 or 8 cM, the entire segment would be retained. If the matching threshold was 9 or greater, the segment would not have been included because of the threshold.

Of course, eight regions in the pileup chart are large enough to match without any additional adjacent segments if the match threshold is 7 cM and the overlap is exact. If the match threshold is 10 cM, only two pileup regions will possibly match by themselves. However, because those two regions are so large, we are more likely to see multiple matches in those regions.

Having a match in a pileup region does NOT invalidate that match. I have many matches in pileup regions that are perfectly valid, often extending beyond that region and attributable to an identified common ancestor.

You may also have pileup regions, in the regions shown in the chart and elsewhere, because of other genealogical reasons, including:

  • Endogamy, where your ancestors descend from a small, intermarried population, either through all or some of your ancestors. The Jewish population is probably the most well-known example of large-scale endogamy over a very long time period.
  • Pedigree collapse, where you descend from the same ancestors in multiple ways in a genealogical timeframe. Endogamy can reach far back in time. With pedigree collapse, you know who your ancestors are and how you descend, but with endogamy, you don’t.
  • Because you descend from an over-represented or over-tested group, such as the Acadians who settled in Nova Scotia in the early 1600s, intermarried and remained relatively isolated until 1755 when they were expelled. Their numerous descendants have settled in many locations. Acadian descendants often have a huge number of Acadian matches.
  • Some combination of all three of the above reasons. Acadians are a combination of both endogamy and pedigree collapse and many of their descendants have tested.

In my case, I have proportionally more Acadian matches than I have other matches, especially given that my Dutch and some of my German lines have few matches because they are recent immigrants with few descendants in the US. This dichotomy makes the proportional difference even more evident and glaring.

I want to stress here that pileup regions are not necessarily bad. In fact, they may provide huge clues to why you match a particular group of people.

Pileup Regions and Genealogy

In 2016, when Ancestry removed matches that involved personal pileup regions, segments that they felt were “too-matchy,” many of my lost matches were either Acadian or Mennonite/Brethren. Both groups are endogamous and experience pedigree collapse.

Over time, as I’ve worked with my DNA matches, painting my segments at DNAPainter, which marks pileup regions, I’ve come to realize that I don’t have more matches on segments spanning standard pileup regions indicated in the Li paper, nor are those matches unreliable.

An unreliable match might be signaled by people who match on that segment but descend from different unrelated common ancestors to me. Each segment tracks to one maternal and one paternal ancestral source, so if we find individuals matching on the same segment who claim descent from different ancestral lines on the same side, that’s a flag that something’s wrong. (That “something” could also be genealogy or descending from multiple ancestors.)

Therefore, after analyzing my own matching patterns, I don’t select the option to remove pileup segments and I don’t discount them. However, this may not be the right selection for everyone. Just remember, you can run the report as many times as your want, so nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Regardless of whether you select the remove pileup segments option or not, the report contents are very interesting.

Pileup Regions in the Report

Let’s take a look at Pileups in the AutoSegment report.

  • If I don’t select the option of removing pileup region segments, I receive a report that shows all of my segments.
  • If I do select the option to remove pileup region segments, here’s what my report says.

Based on the “remove pileup region segments” option selected, all segments should be removed in the pileup regions documented in the Li article if the match overlap is 4.00 cM or larger.

I want to be very clear here. The match itself is NOT removed UNLESS the pileup segment that IS removed causes the person not to be a match anymore. If that person still matches and triangulates on another segment over your selected AutoSegment threshold, those segments will still show.

I was curious about which of my chromosomes have the most matches. That’s exactly what the Pileup Report tells us.

According to the Pileup Report, my chromosome with the highest number of people matching is chromosome 5. The Y (vertical) axis shows the number of people that match on that segment, and the X axis across the bottom shows the match location on the chromosome.

You’ll recall that chromosome 5 was the chromosome from large orange AutoSegment cluster #1 with three distinct segment matches, so this makes perfect sense.

Sure enough, when I view my DNAPainter results, that first pileup region from about location 5-45 are Brethren matches (from my maternal grandfather) and the one from about 48-95 are Acadian matches (from my maternal grandmother.) This too makes sense.

Please note that chromosome 5 has no general pileup regions annotated in the Li table, so no segments would have been removed.

Let’s look at another example where some segments would be removed.

Based on the chromosome table from the Li paper, chromosome 15 has nearly back-to-back pileup regions from about 20-30 with almost 20 cM of DNA combined.

Let’s see what my Pileup Segment Removal Report for chromosome 15 shows.

No segment matches in this region are reported because I selected remove pileup regions.

The only way to tell how many segment matches were removed in this region is to run the report and NOT select the remove pileup segments option. I did that as a basis for comparison.

You can see that about three segments were removed and apparently one of those segments extended further than the other two. It’s also interesting that even though this is designated as a pileup region, I had fewer matches in this region than on other portions of the chromosome.

If I want to see who those segments belong to, I can just view my chromosome 15 results in the AutoSegment-segment-clusters tab in the spreadsheet view which is arranged neatly in chromosome order.

The only way to tell if matches in pileup regions are genealogically valid and relevant is to work with each match or group of matches and determine if they make sense. Does the match extend beyond the pileup region start and end edge? If so, how much? Can you identify a common ancestor or ancestral line, and if so, do the people who triangulate in that segment cluster makes sense?

Of course, my genealogy and therefore my experience will be different than other people’s. Anyone who descends primarily from an endogamous population may be very grateful for the “remove pileups” option. One size does NOT fit all. Fortunately, we have options.

You can run these reports as many times as you want, so you may want to run identical reports and compare a report that removes segments that occur in pileup regions with one that does not.

What’s Next?

For AutoSegment at GEDmatch to work most optimally, you’ll need to do three things:

  • If you don’t have one already, upload a raw DNA file from one of the testing vendors. Instructions here.
  • Upload a GEDCOM file. This allows you to more successfully run tools like AutoTree because your ancestors are present, and it helps other people too. Perhaps they will identify your common ancestor and contact you. You can always email your matches and suggest that they view your GEDCOM file to look for common ancestors or explain what you found using AutoTree. Anyone who has taken the time to learn about GEDmatch and upload a file might well be interested enough to make the effort to upload their GEDCOM file.
  • Convince relatives to upload their DNA files too or offer to upload for them. In my case, triangulating with my cousins is invaluable in identifying which ancestors are represented by each cluster.

If you have not yet uploaded a GEDCOM file to GEDmatch, now’s a great time while you’re thinking about it. You can see how useful AutoClusters and AutoSegment are, so give yourself every advantage in identifying common matches.

If you have a tree at Ancestry, you can easily download a copy and upload to GEDmatch. I wrote step-by-step instructions, here. Of course, you can upload any GEDCOM file from another source including your own desktop computer software.

You never know, using AutoSegment and AutoTree, you may just find common ancestors BETWEEN your matches that you aren’t aware of that might, just might, help you break down YOUR brick walls and find previously unknown ancestors.

AutoSegment tells you THAT you triangulate and exactly where. Now it’s up to you to figure out why.

Give AutoSegment at GEDmatch a try.

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For the past year, WikiTree has been having a weekly Challenge where volunteers work with the genealogy of guests.

Every Wednesday at 8 PM Eastern, a publicly viewable reveal is held for the guest from the week before, and the guest for the new week is introduced.

This week, I’m fortunate enough to be the guest and it’s going to be like Christmas early. If you’re interested, you can view last evening’s kickoff, here.

As an added bonus, Shelley, last week’s guest and I discovered that multiple of our ancestors lived in the same places and even attended the same church. Serendipity at work. I have brick walls. She does too. Maybe Shelley and I are related. Wouldn’t THAT be fun!!!

Want to work on a Challenge or learn more? There’s a great video here.

You can sign up for a Challenge team here, but you don’t have to. Anyone can research and add information to WikiTree profiles. You are most welcome to work on mine this week. In fact, I’m hoping that people with common ancestors will improve the information available. Maybe you’ll discover information that’s new to you too!

The Goal

The goal, broadly speaking, is for WikiTree to provide the most complete, documented, accurate genealogy in a one-large-tree format.

Before WikiTree, I was skeptical and discouraged about big one-single-trees because there were (are) so many errors, but WikiTree is different because it’s collaborative, genial and there are people available to help resolve any issues. Did I mention that everyone is a volunteer?

I enjoy WikiTree. WikiTree is free and allows descendants to enter their Y and mitochondrial information, as well as their GEDmatch ID for autosomal.

WikiTree now has about 27 million-ish profiles, so assuredly there’s something there for everyone.

Challenge is Fair Game

How do volunteers work with genealogy during the challenge? Pretty much any way you want!

People:

  • Break down brick walls (my favorite)
  • Find interesting information about known ancestors
  • Add data and detailed information
  • Provide proofs
  • Upload photos and documents
  • Correct information
  • Saw off branches (yep, it happens)

Volunteers who work on the challenge can accrue points, but it’s more about solving puzzles.

If you want to research, here’s my tree on WikiTree. I’m RobertaEstes13 at Ancestry and you can find my tree by searching for my father, William Sterling Estes 1902-1963. No, it’s not cheating to use every resource available.

Of course, everything is game. I tried to add at least the basic information at WikiTree for all of my known and proven ancestors ahead of time because I didn’t want people to replow a field I had already plowed.

I also made notes when people or data previously added was questionable or needed documentation. I also add each of the 52 Ancestors articles I’ve written about many ancestors.

Brick Walls Set in Concrete

I’ve created a list of my most painful, particularly difficult, brick walls that need attention. I’m hoping that maybe someone else either has that same ancestor, or perhaps has experience in the region. Something. Anything.

James Lee Claxton’s father

I feel like this one is so close, but so far away. We first find James Lee Claxton (Clarkson) in Russell County, VA in 1799. He married and shortly thereafter, moved down the valley to Claiborne County, TN. James died in 1815 in the War of 1812, and thankfully, his widow Sarah Cook, provided information in her land and pension applications. The surname is spelled both Clarkson and Claxton in various places, but based on Y DNA matches, the spelling seems to be Claxton in the other family who shares an earlier ancestor with my James.

In the Claxton Y DNA project, James’s descendants match with a group of people from Bedford County, TN, whose earliest known ancestor is James Claxton born about 1746 and eventually found in Granville Co., North Carolina in 1769. He may be connected to an early Francis Claxton from Bertie County.

Two genealogists compiled information about this line on a now somewhat dated website. Some links are broken, but the data is still quite useful. However, a lovely summary can be found, here.

James Claxton born about 1746, reportedly, had a son James who was found in 1798 in Sumner County, TN, so my James could not be the son of James born in 1746 if this is accurate. However, based on autosomal DNA matches between the two groups, these two lines, meaning mine and the Bedford County line, can’t be very distantly removed.

The James from North Carolina is named in 1784 as the executor of the will of John Hatcher whose wife, Mary, is proven Native based on their son’s Revolutionary War testimony. We don’t know why James was named as executor, or if they were related. It would be easy to assume that he was married to a daughter, but there is no evidence for that either.

Unfortunately, there are no other Claxton Y DNA matches that can push this line further back in time, anyplace.

I wrote about James Lee Claxton, here and his WikiTree profile is here.

Joel Cook and Family

Sarah’s says, in her pension application, that her father was Joel Cook and he is quite a conundrum. Based on the history of the region, he was clearly born elsewhere and settled in Russell County about 1795, as the frontier was settled. He is associated with a Clayton (Claton) Cook who moved to Kentucky about 1794, then back, then back to Kentucky again.

Records are sparse. Joel sells his land in 1816. It has been suggested that he migrated to Floyd County, KY, or perhaps elsewhere, along with Clayton, but I don’t have any evidence of that – or anything else for that matter.

Joel arrived out of thin air and disappeared into thin air. The only other hint we have is that a young man, Henry Cook, served as a drummer in the War of 1812 from Claiborne County, TN, and died in the service. It’s certainly possible that he was Sarah’s younger brother or maybe nephew.

We don’t have Y DNA from this line. If the Floyd County Cook group Y DNA tests, it would be nice to know if any of those people match any of Sarah Cook’s descendants.

I haven’t written about either Sarah or her father, Joel, but Sarah’s Wikitree profile is here and Joel’s is here.

By the way, I inadvertently think I and other early genealogists were responsible for the misinformation on her profile that Sarah’s birth surname is Helloms. In 1850 she is living with a man, John Helloms, 5 years younger than she is who is listed as an “idiot.” It was assumed that this was her brother and her surname was assigned as Helloms before we had her pension application. Now I suspect that as a widow, she may have been paid by the Hancock County court to take care of him. Court records have burned. There may be a connection with this family however, as she was assigned as the administrator of a William Hulloms estate in Claiborne County in 1820, not long after her husband’s death.

Unfortunately, Helloms as Sarah’s maiden name won’t seem to die, no matter how many times I saw that branch off of the tree. Having said that, it’s probable that somehow, given her relatively close involvement with Helloms men twice, 30 years apart, that she is somehow related.

Charles Campbell’s Father

John Campbell born about 1772 and George Campbell born about 1770, probably in Virginia, are believed to be the sons of Charles Campbell who lived in Hawkins County, TN. Unfortunately, Charles, who died about 1825, had no will and much to my chagrin, the deed for his land after his death was never actually recorded.

The Y DNA clearly provides matching to the Campbell line from Inverary, Argylishire, Scotland. Both the migration path and neighbors combined with DNA matching suggests strongly that Charles migrated from the Orange/Augusta/Rockingham County portion of Virginia.

I chased a hot lead based on matches that suggest Gilbert Campbell’s line and wrote about that, here. Gilbert had a son named Charles, but in-depth research indicates that his son Charles is probably accounted for in Virginia. Gilbert did have a brother or son named James. We don’t know who the parents of James and Gilbert were and that’s key to this equation.

Oral history suggests a connection with a James Campbell. It’s possible that this John and this George were a different John and George than Charles jointly sold land to, although it’s highly doubtful.

Both John and George Campbell married Dobkins sisters, daughters of Jacob Dobkins who lived up the road from Charles Campbell before the entire Dobkins/Campbell group moved to Claiborne County, TN together about 1800.

I wrote about John Campbell, here and his WikiTree profile is here. Charles Campbell’s story is here and his profile is here.

Julien Lord or Lore’s Origins

Julien Lord, born someplace about 1652, probably in France, is one of the early Acadian settlers. Julien is listed in 1665 on a list of soldiers who sailed for Nova Scotia. He would only have been 13. He is later listed on various census documents which is how we obtained his birth year.

I know that recently additional documents have become available in France and I’m hopeful that perhaps his association with the other men might pinpoint an area and we can find Julien’s parents. Of course, the surname could have been spelled much differently in France – Lohr, Loire, Loree, etc. I can’t help but wonder if he was an orphan and that’s why he was shipped out.

Julien Lord’s WikiTree profile is here.

Magdalene (birth surname unknown,) wife of Philip Jacob Miller

This one is driving me insane. Magdalena was born sometime about 1730, probably in Pennsylvania among the Brethren or possibly Mennonite families. She married Philip Jacob Miller, a Brethren man, about 1751, just as he was moving from York County, PA to Frederick Co., VA.

Magdalena was assuredly Brethren or Mennonite, because marriages outside the faith were not allowed at that time and those who did were effectively shunned unless the spouse converted.

Magdalena’s surname was rumored to be Rochette for years, but thorough research produced not one shred of evidence that Rochette is accurate. There aren’t even any Rochette families living anyplace close. Everyone has heard that rumor, and no one knows it’s source.

We do have Magdalena’s mitochondrial DNA signature. Her haplogroup is H6a1a and she has 2 exact matches. One match provided no genealogical information but the other match showed her ancestor as Amanda Troutwine (1872-1946) who married William Hofaker. I did some genealogical sleuthing several years ago and based on superficial information, found the following lineage for Amanda Troutwine.

  • Sarah Baker 1851-1923 and George Troutwine

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/141291811

  • Elias Baker and Mary Baker 1824-1897

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/141291811

  • Jacob Baker and Sarah Michael 1801-1892

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/10806589/mary-baker

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/36831933/sarah-baker

  • Mary Myers 1775-1849 buried Clayton, Montgomery Co., Ohio m Jacob Michael

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/38045030/mary-michael

https://www.ancestry.com/family-tree/person/tree/91021180/person/74020727592/facts?_phsrc=fxJ1330&_phstart=successSource

  • Johannes Meyer and Margaretha Scherman 1750-1825

https://www.ancestry.com/family-tree/person/tree/91021180/person/280002009231/facts

I have not confirmed this information. If it is accurate, Margaretha born in 1750 could be Magdalena’s sister or niece, perhaps?

I created a tiny tree and discovered that Mary’s husband lived in Frederick County, Maryland, the same place that Philip Jacob Miller and Magdalena lived. Mary died in Montgomery County, Ohio, the same place that many Brethren families settled and very close to the Miller men.

Mary’s WikiTree profile is here and shows her mother, Margaret Sherman/Schuermann to have been born about 1750 in York County, PA, the location where the Miller family was living. The question is, who was Margaret’s mother. Is this the clue to solving the identity of Magdalena, the wife of Philip Jacob Miller?

I wrote about Magdalena, here, including a list of known Brethren families, and her WikiTree profile is here.

Barbara (birth surname unknown) Estes Mitochondrial DNA

Barbara (birth surname unknown) Estes, born sometime around 1670 was (at least) the second wife of Abraham Estes.

Abraham’s first wife, Barbara Burton, died in England before he immigrated in 1673.

For years, on almost every tree, her surname has been shown as Brock, but there is absolutely no evidence that’s correct.

Abraham’s daughter, Barbara Estes married Henry Brock, so there was indeed a Barbara Brock, but this person was the daughter, NOT the wife of Abraham Estes. A man wrote a novel, as in fiction, in the 1980s that assigned Abraham’s wife’s surname as Brock and that myth simply won’t die.

I would very much like to find a mitochondrial descendant of Barbara, Abraham’s wife, mother to his children, to take a mitochondrial DNA test. Mitochondrial DNA is inherited from a direct line of matrilineal ancestors. Anyone today, male or female, who descends from Barbara directly through all females from any of her daughters carries Barbara’s mitochondrial DNA. Mitochondrial DNA may lead us to Barbara’s parents.

I wrote about Barbara, here, and her WikiTree profile is here.

Bonus Round – Elizabeth (surname unknown,) wife of Stephen Ulrich

Elizabeth was born about 1725, possibly in Germany and if not, probably in Pennsylvania. She married Stephen Ulrich sometime around 1743 and died in around 1782 in Frederick County, Maryland. Unfortunately, her identity has been confused with that of her daughter, Elizabeth Ulrich (1757-1832) who married Daniel Miller. And as if that wasn’t confusing enough, her mother-in-law’s name was also Elizabeth, so we had three Elizabeth Ulrich’s three generations in a row.

We have two testers who believe they descend from Elizabeth. Unfortunately, one of them is incorrect, and I have no idea which one.

Tester #1 shows that he descends from Hannah Susan Ulrich (1762-1798) who married Henry Adams Puterbaugh (1761-1839), is haplogroup U2e1, and matches with someone whose most distant ancestor is Elizabeth Rench born in 1787 in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania and died in 1858 in Ohio. I did as much research as possible and wrote about that, here.

Then, I went to visit Elizabeth’s WikiTree profile here which, I might note, reflects the long-standing oral history that Elizabeth’s birth surname was Cripe.

I noticed at WikiTree that another individual has indicated that he has tested for Elizabeth’s mitochondrial DNA, and it’s an entirely different haplogroup, H6a1b3. Uh oh!

He descends through daughter, Susannah Ulrich who married Jacob I. Puterbaugh.

My heart sank. I don’t know who is right and who is wrong, but both can’t be correct. Unless of course Stephen Ulrich was married twice.

My tester’s most distant ancestor on WikiTree is found here. If the genealogy is accurate, her line will connect with Hannah Susan Ulrich (1762-1798) who married Henry Adams Puterbaugh (1761-1839).

A third mitochondrial DNA tester through a different daughter would also break this tie. Anybody descend from Elizabeth, wife of Stephen Ulrich, through all females? If so, please raise your hand!

WikiTree Challenge Results Next Wednesday

I can hardly wait until next Wednesday’s reveal to see what so many wonderful volunteers will find. Breaking through tough brick walls would be wonderful, but so would anything.

I’m excited and oh so very grateful for this opportunity.

If you’re not familiar with WikiTree, take a look for yourself.

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Genetic Affairs – New AutoKinship Tool Predicts Relationships and Builds Genetic Trees

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Genetic Affairs recently introduced a new tool – AutoKinship. Evert-Jan (EJ) Blom, the developer was kind enough to step through these results with me to assure that I’m explaining things correctly. Thanks EJ!

AutoKinship automatically predicts family trees and pathways that you may be related to your matches based on how they match you and each other. Not only is this important for genealogists trying to piece our family tree together, it’s indispensable for anyone searching for unknown ancestors, beginning with parents and walking right on up the tree for the closest several generations.

Right now, the automated AutoKinship tool is limited to 23andMe profiles, but will also work as a standalone tool where users can fill in the shared DNA information for their matches. MyHeritage, 23andMe, and GEDMatch provide centiMorgan information about how your matches also match each other. Here’s a tutorial for the standalone tool.

Unfortunately, Ancestry does not provide their customers with segment information, but fortunately, you can upload a copy of your Ancestry DNA file to MyHeritage, FamilyTreeDNA or GEDmatch, for free. You’ll find step-by-step instructions, here.

Automated AutoKinship Tool

After signing into to your Genetic Affairs account, assuming you have already set up your 23andMe profile at Genetic Affairs, click on “Run AutoKinship for 23andMe.”

I manage multiple profiles at 23andMe, so I need to click on “Profiles.”

Select the correct profile if you manage multiple kits at 23andMe.

You’ll see your various options that can be run for your 23andMe kit.

Select AutoKinship

If you select AutoKinship, you automatically receive an AutoCluster because AutoKinship is built on the AutoCluster functionality.

Make your selections. I recommend leaving these settings at the default, at least initially.

The default of 250 cM excludes your closest matches. You don’t want your closest matches because they will be members of too many clustered groups.

In my initial run, I made the mistake of changing the 50 cM lower threshold to 20 cM because I wanted more matches to be included. Unfortunately, the effect this had on my results was that my largest two clusters did not produce trees.

Hint: EJ states that the software tool works from the smallest cluster to the largest when producing trees. If you notice that your largest cluster, which is usually the first one displayed in the upper left hand corner (orange here), does not have associated trees, or some people are missing, that’s your clue that the AutoKinship ran out of server time to process and you need to raise either the minimum match threshold, in this case, 50 cM, or the minimum amount of DNA shared between your matches to each other, in this case, 10 cM.

You can also select between shared matches and triangulated groups. I selected shared matches, but I may well rerun this report with triangulated groups because that provides me with a great deal of even more useful information.

When you’re ready, click on the big green “you can’t miss it” Perform AutoCluster Analysis button.

Make a cup of coffee. Your report is processing. If your email doesn’t arrive, you can click on the little envelope in your Genetic Affairs profile and the report can be downloaded to your computer directly from that link.

Your Report Arrives!

You’ll receive a zip file in the email that you MUST SAVE TO YOUR COMPUTER to work correctly. You’ll see these files, but you can’t use them yet.

First, you MUST EXTRACT THE FILES from the zip file. My zip file displays the names of the file inside of the zipped file, but they are not extracted.

You must right click, as shown above, and then click on “Extract All” on a PC. Not sure what MAC users need to do but I think it autoextracts. If you click on some of the files in this article and they don’t load correctly, or say they aren’t present, that likely means:

  • You either forgot to save the file in the email to your computer
  • Or you failed to do the extract

The bottom two files are your normal AutoCluster visual html file and the same information in an excel file.

Click on the AutoCluster html file to activate.

Personally, I love watching the matches all fly into place in their clusters. This html file is going to be our home base, the file we’ll be operating from for all of the functions.

I have a total of 23 interrelated autoclusters. The question is, how are we all related to each other. You can read my article about AutoClusters and how they work here.

People who are members of more than one cluster are shown with those little grey squares signifying that they match people in two clusters, not just one cluster.

For example, one cluster might be my grandparents, but the second cluster might be my maternal great-great-grandfather. Membership in both clusters tells me that my matching DNA with those people in the second cluster probably descends from my great-great-grandfather. Some of the DNA matches in the first cluster assuredly also descend from that man, but some of them may descend from other related ancestors, like my maternal grandmother. It’s our job as genealogists to discern the connections, but the entire purpose of AutoKinship is to make that process much easier.

We are going to focus on the first few clusters to see what kinds of information Genetic Affairs can produce about these clusters. Notice that the first person in row 1 is related to the orange cluster, the green cluster, the purple and the brown clusters. That’s important information about that person, and also about the interrelationship of those clusters themselves and the ancestors they represent.

Remember, to be included in a grandparent cluster, that person’s DNA segment(s) must have descended from other ancestors, represented in other clusters. So you can expect one person to be found potentially in multiple clusters that serve to trace those common ancestors (and associated segments) back in time.

AutoKinship

The AutoKinship portion of this tool creates hypothetical trees based on relationships of you to each person in the cluster, and to the other cluster members to each other.

If you’re thinking triangulation, you’re right. I selected matches, not triangulated groups which is also an option. Some people do triangulate, but some people may match each other on different segments. Right now, it’s a jumble of hints, but we’ll sort some of this out.

If you scroll down in your html file, below your cluster, and below the explanation (which you should read,) you’ll see the AutoKinship verbiage.

I want to do a quick shout-out to Brit Nicholson, the statistician that works with EJ on probabilities of relationships for this tool and describes his methodology, here.

AutoKinship Table

You’ll see the AutoKinship Table that includes a link for each cluster that could be assembled into a potential tree.

Click on the cluster you wish to view.

In my case, clusters 1 through 5 are closely related to each other based on the common members in each cluster. I selected cluster 1.

Your most probable tree for that cluster will be displayed.

I’m fortunate that I recognized three of my third cousins. AutoKinship constructed a probable genetic pedigree, but I’ve overlayed what I know to be the correct pedigree.

With the exception of one person, this AutoKinship tree is accurate to the best of my knowledge. A slot for Elizabeth, the mother of William George Estes and the daughter of Joel is missing. I probably know why. I match two of my cousins with a higher than expected amount of DNA which means that I’m shown “closer” in genetic distance that I normally would be for that relationship level.

In one case, Charles and I share multiple ancestors. In the other case, I don’t know why I match Everett on so much more DNA than his brother Carl or our other cousin, Vianna. Regardless, I do.

In one other instance, there’s a half-relationship that throws a wrench into the tree. I know that, but it’s very difficult to factor half-relationships into tree building without prior knowledge.

If you continue to scroll down, you’ll see multiple options for trees for this cluster.

DNA Matrix

Below that, you’ll see a wonderful downloadable DNA matrix of how everyone in the cluster shares DNA with everyone else in the cluster.

At this point, exit from cluster one and return to your original cluster file that shows your cluster matrix.

Beneath the AutoKinship table, you’ll see AutoCluster Cluster Information.

AutoCluster Cluster Information

Click on any one of those people. I’m selecting Everett because I know how we are related.

Voila, a new cluster configuration forms.

I can see all of the people I match in common with Everett in each cluster. This tells me two things:

  • Which clusters are related to this line. In particular, the orange cluster, green, red, purple, brown, magenta and dark grey clusters. If you mouse over each cell in the cluster, more information is provided.
  • The little helix in each cell tells you that those two people triangulate with each other and the tester. How cool is that?!!

Note that you can display this cluster in 4 different ways.

Return again to your main autocluster page and scroll down once again.

This just might be my favorite part.

Chromosome Segments

You can import chromosome segment information into DNAPainter – instructions here.

What you’ll see next is the clusters painted on your chromosomes. I love this!!!

Of course, Genetic Affairs can’t tell you which side is maternal and which is paternal. You’ll need to do that yourself after you import into DNAPainter.

Just beneath this painting, you’ll see a chart titled Chromosome segment statistics per AutoCluster cluster.

I’m only showing the first couple as an example.

Click on one of links. I’m selecting cluster 1.

Cluster 1 has painted portions of each chromosome, but I’m only displaying chromosomes 1-7 here.

Following the painting is a visual display of each overlap region by cluster, by overlapping segment on each chromosome.

You can clearly see where these segments overlap with each other!

Surname Enrichment

If you select the surname enrichment option, you’ll receive two additional features in your report.

Please note that I ran this option separately at a different time, so the cluster members and clusters themselves do not necessarily correlate with the examples above.

The Enriched Surname section of your report shows surnames in common found between the matches in each specific cluster.

Keep in mind, this does NOT just mean surnames in common with YOUR surname list, assuming you’ve entered your surnames at 23andMe. (If you haven’t please do so now.) 23andMe does not support user trees, so your entered surnames are all that can be utilized when comparing information from your matches.

These are surnames that are found more than once among your matches. I’ve framed the ones in red that I recognize as being found in my tree, and I’ve framed the ones in black that I recognize as being “married in.” In other words, some people may descend through children of my ancestors who married people with that black bracketed surname.

I can tell you immediately, based on these surnames, that the first cluster is the cluster formed around my great-great-grandparents, Joel Vannoy and his wife, Phebe Crumley.

Cluster 6 is less evident, but Anderson might be connected to the Vannoy family. I’ll need to view the common matches in that cluster at 23andMe and look for additional clues.

Cluster 9 is immediately evident too. Ferverda is Hiram Ferverda, my great-grandfather and Eva Miller is his wife.

Cluster 10 is probably the Miller line as well. Indiana is a location in this case, not a surname.

Click on “Detailed Surname Table” for more information, as shown below.

Each group of people that shares any surname is shown in a table together. In this case, these three people, who I happen to know are brothers, all share these surnames. The surnames they also share with me are shown with red boxes. The other surnames are shared only with each other and no one else in the cluster. I know they aren’t shared with me because I know my tree.

While your initial reaction may be that this isn’t terribly useful, it is actually a HUGE gift. Especially if you find a cluster you aren’t familiar with.

Mystery Cluster

A mystery cluster is an opportunity to break down a brick wall. This report tells you which people to view on your match list who share that surname. My first step is to use that list and see who I match in common with each person at 23andMe.

My relatives in common with my Cluster 10 matches include my close Ferverda cousins who descend from our common Miller ancestor, plus a few Miller cousins. This confirms that this cluster does indeed originate in the Miller line.

Not everyone in that cluster shares the surname Miller. That might be a good thing.

I have a long-standing brick wall with Magdalena (surname unknown) who was married to Philip Jacob Miller, my 5-times great-grandparents. My cousins through that couple, at my same generation, would be about 6th cousins.

These matches are matching me at the approximate 4th cousin level or more distantly, so it’s possible that at least some of these matches COULD be through Magdalena’s family. In that case, I certainly would not recognize the common surnames. Therefore, it’s imperative that I chase these leads. I can also adjust the matching threshold to obtain more matches, hopefully, in this cluster, and run the report again.

Are you in love with Autokinship and its associated features yet? I am!

Summary

Wow is all I can say. There’s enough in this one report to keep me busy for days, especially since 23andMe does not support a tree function in the traditional genealogical sense.

I have several matches that I have absolutely no idea how they are related to me. This helps a great deal and allows to me systematically approach tree-building or identifying ancestors.

You can see if 23andMe has predicted these relationships in the same way, but other than messaging your matches, or finding them at another vendor who does support a tree, there’s no way to know if either 23andMe’s autogenerated tree or the Genetic Affairs trees are accurate.

What Genetic Affairs provides that 23andMe does not is composite information in one place – as a group in a cluster. You don’t have to figure out who matches whom one by one and create your own matrix. (Yes, I used to do that.)

You can also import the Genetic Affairs information into DNAPainter to make further use of these segments. I’ve written about using DNAPainter, here.

Once you’ve identified how one person in any cluster connects, you’ve found your lever to unlock the identity of the ancestors whose DNA is represented in that particular cluster – and an important clue/link to associated clusters as well.

If you don’t recognize these cousins at 23andMe, look for common surnames on your DNA Relatives match list, or see if a known close relative on your maternal or paternal side matches these people found in a cluster. Click on each match at 23andMe to see if they have provided notes, surnames, locations or even a link to a tree at another vendor.

Don’t forget, you can also select the “Based on Triangulated Groups” option instead of the “Based on Shared Matches” option initially.

Run A Report

If you have tested at 23andMe, give the Genetic Affairs AutoKinship report a try.

Is it accurate for you? Have you gained insight? Identified how people are related to you? Are there any surprises?

Do you have a mystery cluster? I hope so, because an answer just might be hiding there.

If you’d like to read more about Genetic Affairs tools, click here for my free repository of Genetic Affairs articles.

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I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

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DNA Beginnings: Matching at Ancestry and What It Means

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This is the fourth in the series of “DNA Beginnings” articles. Previous articles you might enjoy include:

Why Is Matching Important?

For genealogists, DNA matching to other people is the key to verifying your ancestors, beginning with your parents and continuing up your tree. You can also meet new cousins who may have information, including photos, that you don’t.

Each of the four major vendors has benefits that the others don’t have. As we review matches at each vendor, we’ll discuss the plusses and minuses of each one and how to use their unique features to benefit your genealogy quest.

Let’s start with Ancestry.

Ancestry

The highest total number of people have tested their DNA with Ancestry, although I’m not certain that holds true for testers outside the US.

This means that you are likely to find at least some close matches at Ancestry. Every vendor has people in their database that no other vendor has though. I recommend testing at the 4 major vendors, including FamilyTreeDNA, MyHeritage, and 23andMe.

At Ancestry, Where Are My Matches?

You’ll find the list of people who match you under the “DNA”, then “DNA Matches” tabs at Ancestry.

Ancestry packs a lot of information into your match pages. Let’s take a look at what that means to you as a genealogist and how you can make it work for you.

Clcik to enlarge images

I’ll be discussing each one of these areas, below, so refer back. Let’s start with the basic page arrangement.

  • Features at the top apply to managing and working with all of your matches
  • Features under each match apply to that match only.

Pretty straightforward.

I’ll begin at the top and review each item, but first, let’s talk about testing your parents.

Test Your Parents

First, if you have either or both parents available to test, by all means, test both parents and not just at Ancestry. This is sage advice for all vendors.

Be aware that if one or both of your parents are not your biological parents, DNA testing will reveal that fact.

When your parent tests, matches that Ancestry can automatically attribute to that parent’s side of your family based on matching you and your parent, both, are noted as such.

While this is useful, especially since maternally and paternally assigned matches are your closest matches, Ancestry only automatically assigns about as many matches as fall into your close matches category. Someplace between half and 1% of your total matches. I sort of deflated like a balloon when I made that discovery. 

It’s still definitely worth testing your parents, though, because you will be able to view your matches to see if they match you and a parent both. Even if Ancestry doesn’t assign them maternally or paternally, you can certainly derive clues from who you match in common – and you can assign matches yourself.

We will talk about exactly how to do this in a bit!

Now, back to the function bar.

The Function Bar

The function bar beneath the ad promoting parental testing is your driver’s seat.

Click to enlarge images

You’ll find a variety of filters and functions like searching and sorting your matches. In other words, these are the actions you can take. Let’s start with the filters, on the left.

  • Unviewed – The “Unviewed” filter widget displays only matches you have not yet viewed. Unviewed matches are annotated with a blue dot. Because your matches are displayed in highest to lowest order, you’ll see your closest unviewed match first. I use this filter a lot because it means I don’t have to scroll through the matches I’ve already viewed and analyzed.

I have a “one initial touch” policy. When I initially view a match, I step through all the functions I can utilize to identify how that person is (potentially) related to me and I make notes.

The rest of these filters and functions are important steps in that analysis process.

Please notice that you can combine filters.

I’ve clicked both the “Unviewed” and the “Common Ancestors” filters, meaning BOTH of these filters are simultaneously functioning. If you just want one filter, be sure to “Reset Filters” before clicking a second filter button.

  • Common Ancestors – That infamous little green leaf. In this case, when viewing DNA matches, that green leaf is very important because it indicates that Ancestry has found a (potential) common ancestor between you and your match.

Clicking on the little green leaf shows you the most recent common ancestor(s) that Ancestry believes you share with that match based on:

  1. The fact that your DNA does match
  2. And that you have common ancestors either in your tree
  3. Or ancestors that can be linked to both of you through other people’s trees

Notice Ancestry’s careful wording about these potential ancestors. Megan “could be” my 5th cousin once removed. “Could be.” Ancestry isn’t using weasel words here, but trying to convey the fact that people’s genealogy, Megan’s, mine or other peoples’ can be wrong.

In other words, Ancestry has found a potential link between me and Megan, but it may not be valid. These connections use trees to suggest common ancestors and some trees are not reliable. It’s up to me (and you) to confirm that suggested ancestral path.

Clicking on “View Relationship” takes me to the Ancestry tool known as ThruLines which shows me how Megan and I may be related.

I have Stephen Miller in my tree, but not his son John J. Miller as indicated by the hashed boxes.

I can click on the Evaluate button to see what type of evidence and which trees Ancestry used to assign John J. Miller as the son of Stephen Miller. In other words, I can accumulate my own evidence to validate, verify, or refute the connection to Daniel Miller for me and Megan.

I wrote about ThruLines here and here.

  • Messaged – The “Messaged” filter button shows matches I’ve sent messages to through Ancestry’s messaging feature.

You can track your messages in the little envelope button by your name at upper right.

  • Notes – The “Notes” filter shows your matches and the notes you’ve made about that match. I use notes extensively so I don’t replow the same field.

In my case, I took a second test at Ancestry several years ago when they introduced a new chip to compare to the results of my original test. I noted that this is my V2 test in this example.

Normally my notes are genealogy-related, especially in cases where I’ve discovered more than one set of common ancestors through multiple lines. I record hints here, such as which of my closest relatives this person also matches. I also record our common ancestor when I identify who that is or even who it might be.

You can create a note by clicking on the match, then on “Add Note” near the top.

  • Trees – The “Trees” filter provides the ability to view matches who have only specific tree statuses.

Perhaps you only want to view only people with public, linked trees. Why are public, linked trees important?

Public trees can be seen and searched by your matches. Private trees cannot be seen by matches.

A public, linked tree means that your match has linked their DNA test to their own profile card in a public tree. The linking process tells Ancestry who “they are” in their tree and allows Ancestry to begin searching from that person up their tree to see if they can identify common ancestors with their matches. In other words, linking allows Ancestry’s tools to work for you and allows other people to view your position in your tree so that can see how you might share ancestors.

Some people don’t understand the linking process, so I normally take a look at unlinked trees too, especially if the person only has one tree.

Be sure your DNA test is linked to your tree by clicking on the little down arrow by your user name in the upper right-hand corner of the screen, then, click on “Your Profile,” then click on the settings gear beneath your name.

Then click on DNA:

You’ll see the tests that you own, so click on the little right arrow (>) to work with a specific test.

Finally, you’ll see the name on the test, the profile it’s connected to, and the name of the tree.

Not accurate or what you want? You can change it!

Ok, back to working with filters. Next, Shared DNA.

  • “Shared DNA” allows you to view only specific relationships of matches.

I use this tab mostly to see how many matches I have.

  • The “Groups” filter categorizes matches by the colored dot groups you establish. Matches can be assigned to single or multiple groups.

The good news is that you have 24 colored dot buttons that represent groups to work with. The bad news is that you have only 24 that you can assign.

Generally, I assign colored dots, and therefore matches, to a couple, not an individual. In some cases, especially with two marriages, I have assigned match buttons to a single ancestor. Of course, that means that one couple uses 2 colored buttons☹

After you’ve created your groups, you can assign a match to a group, or multiple groups, by clicking on your match.

“Add to group” is located right beside “Add note,” so I do both at the same time for each match.

I have one group called “Ancestor Identified” which is reserved for all ancestors who don’t have colored group dots assigned. I can tell which ancestor by reading the notes I’ve entered.

To view every match in a particular group, click on that group, then “apply” at the bottom.

The matches displayed will only be the 17 matches that I’ve assigned to the blue dot group – all descended from Antoine Lore (and his wife).

However, looking at who I match in common with these 17 people can lead me to more people descended from Antoine, his wife, or their ancestors.

  • Search – The “Search” function at far right allows you to search your matches in multiple ways, but not by the most important aspect of genealogy.

  1. You can search by the match’s name; first, last or Ancestry user name.
  2. You can search by surname in your matches’ trees. I sure hope you don’t have Jones.
  3. You can search by birth location in matches’ trees.
  4. You CANNOT search by ancestor. Say what???

Seriously.

Come on Ancestry…don’t make this intentionally difficult.

  • “Sort” allows you to sort your match list either by relationship (the default) or by date. I’d trade this for search by ancestor in a New York Minute.

We are finished with the filters and functions for managing your entire list, so let’s see what we can do with each individual match.

Match Information

We’ve already learned a lot about our matches just by using different filters, but there’s a lot more available.

You’ll need to click on various areas of the match to view specific or additional information.

Click on the predicted relationship, like 5th-8th cousin, to view how closely Ancestry,  thinks you are related based on the amount of DNA you share. If you click on the relationship, Ancestry displays the various relationship possibilities and how likely each one is.

Looks like there’s a bit of a disconnect, because while Ancestry predicts this relationship with 17 shared cM of DNA at 5th-8th cousin, their chart shows that variations of 3rd or 4th cousin are more likely. This is a great example of why you should always click on the predicted relationship and check for yourself.

Conversely, if you’re related to a match through multiple lines, or through one set of ancestors more than once, Ancestry may predict that you are related more closely than you actually are – because you may carry more of that ancestor’s DNA. Ancestry, nor any other vendor, has any way of knowing why you carry that amount of ancestral DNA.

Ancestry also shows you a little more information about how much DNA you share, and how many segments. Unfortunately, Ancestry does not provide a chromosome browser, so there isn’t any more you can do, at Ancestry, with this information – although you can certainly transfer your DNA to MyHeritage, FamilyTreeDNA, or GedMatch (a third-party tool) who all provide chromosome browsers.

Ancestry shows you the number of cMs, or centiMorgans of DNA you share. Think about a centiMorgan as a length measure, for practical purposes. Each vendor has their own matching threshold and a matching piece of DNA with another person must be larger than that bar. Ancestry’s minimum cM threshold is 8 cM, the highest of all the vendors.

This means that any match lower than 8 cM is not considered a match at Ancestry, but that same person might appear on your match list at another vendor whose match threshold is lower.

Ancestry also removes some of your matching DNA before considering matches. In areas where your DNA is “too matchy,” Ancestry removes some segments because they feel that DNA may be “older” and not genealogically relevant.

There’s a great deal of debate about this practice, and strong feelings abound. Some people feel this is justified because it helps reduce the large number of matches, especially for people who descend from highly endogamous populations.

Other people who have one endogamous line among many others find that many or most of their matches from that population were removed by Ancestry when they did one of their two purges. That’s what happened to my Acadian and many of my African American matches.

Regardless, Ancestry tells you for each match if they removed DNA segments using their Timber algorithm, and if so, how many.

Clearly, when viewing this match, 1 cM of removed DNA isn’t going to make much if any difference unless that 1cM was the difference between being a match and not matching. You can read Ancestry’s paper about how their matching works beneath the hood, here.

There are only two real differences that DNA removal makes at Ancestry:

  • Whether you match or not, meaning you’re either over or under that 8 cM bar.
  • Shared matches under 20 cM won’t show, so if you have 22 cM of shared DNA with someone and Ancestry removes 3, you won’t show as a shared match to people you match in common. And people you match in common, if they have less than 20 cM shared DNA won’t show to you either.

Since Ancestry doesn’t provide their customers with advanced tools to compare segments of DNA with their matches, other than the two circumstances above, the removal of some DNA doesn’t really matter.

That might be more than you wanted to know! However, if you find some matches confusing, especially if you know two people are both matching you and each other, but they don’t show as a shared match, this just might be why. We’ll talk about shared matches in a minute.

Do Your Recognize Your Matches?

Ancestry provides a way for you to assign relationships.

If you click on “Learn more,” you’ll view the match page that shows their tree, common ancestors with you, if identified, and more.

If you click “Yes,” you’ll be prompted for how you match.

Ancestry will ask if you know the specific relationship based on the probabilities of that relationship being accurate.

After you confirm, that individual will be assigned to that parental side of your family, or both, based on your selection.

Shared Matches

Shared matches are a way of viewing who you and one of your matches both match.

In other words, if you recognize other people you both match, that’s a HUGE clue as to how you and your match are related. However, it’s not an absolute, because you could match two people through entirely different lines, and they could match each other through another line not related to you. However, shared matching does provide hints, especially if your match matches several relatives you can identify who descend from the same ancestor or ancestral couple.

This match only has initials and a private unlinked tree. That means they aren’t linked to the proper place in their tree, and their tree is private so I can’t view it to evaluate for hints.

How can I possibly figure out how we are related?

Click on the match.

Clicking on Shared Matches shows me the people that T. F. and I both match.

Notice that T. F. and I match my 5 top matches on my mother’s side. Clearly, T. F. and I share common ancestors on my mother’s side.

Furthermore, based on my notes and the amount of DNA we share, our common ancestor is probably my great-grandparents.

This match was easy to unravel, but not all are. Lets’s look at a different shared match list.

In this example, all 4 people have unlinked trees. The smallest shared match is 20 cM –  because Ancestry doesn’t show smaller shared matches below 20 cM. Of course, there are probably a lot of smaller shared matches, but I can’t see them. In essence, this limits viewing your shared matches to the 4th-6th cousin range or closer.

Just be aware that you’re not seeing all of your shared matches, so don’t assume you are.

Summary

By reviewing each match at Ancestry using a methodical step-by-step approach, there’s a great deal of information to be gleaned.

Let’s summarize briefly:

  • Your matches listed first on your match list are your closest, and likely to be the most useful to you in terms of identifying maternal and paternal sides of your family for other matches.
  • Test either or both parents if possible
  • Link yourself and the DNA kits you manage to their proper place in your tree so that Ancestry can provide you with parental sides for your matches if your parents have tested. Ancestry uses linked trees for ThruLines tii.
  • Manually assign “sides” to matches if your parents aren’t available to test.
  • Use the filters or combinations. Don’t forget to reset.
  • Click on “Common Ancestors” to view potential common ancestors – matches exhibiting those green leaves. This is Ancestry’s strength.
  • From Common Ancestors, check ThruLines to view matches linked to a common ancestor.
  • Don’t neglect unlinked trees.
  • Assign dot colors to ancestral couples or a way that makes sense to you.
  • Assign matches by colored dot group.
  • Make notes that will help you remember details about the match and what you have and have not done with or learned about that match.
  • Search by location or surname or a combination of both.
  • Assign relationships, when known. At least assign maternally or paternally, or both if the match is related through both sides of your family. Hint – your full siblings, their children, and your children are related to both sides – your mother’s and father’s sides, both.
  • Click on your match’s profile to view additional information, including common ancestors and their tree. Scroll down to view common surnames, locations and ancestors from both people (you and your match) found in those locations.
  • View shared matches to see who else you and your match are both related to. Your shared matches may well hold the key to how you and an unknown match are related. Don’t forget that Ancestry only displays shared matches of 20 cM or larger.
  • If you’d like to utilize a chromosome browser for additional insights and to confirm specific common ancestors by shared segments of DNA, download a copy of your raw DNA data file and upload, free, to both FamilyTreeDNA and MyHeritage, here. They both provide chromosome browsers and advanced tools.

You can find step-by-step instructions for downloading from Ancestry and uploading elsewhere, here.

Join Me for More!

I’ll be publishing similar articles about working with matches at FamilyTreeDNA, MyHeritage and 23andMe soon.

If you haven’t tested at all of these vendors and would like to, just click on these links for more information or to order tests:

Subscribe to this Free Blog

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Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

DNA Purchases and Free Uploads

Genealogy Products and Services

Books

  • com – Lots of wonderful genealogy research books

Genealogy Research

Free Webinar: 10 Ways to Find Your Native American Ancestor Using Y, Mitochondrial and Autosomal DNA

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I recorded 10 Ways to Find Your Native American Ancestor Using Y, Mitochondrial and Autosomal DNA for Legacy Family Tree Webinars.

Webinars are free for the first week. After that, you’ll need a subscription.

If you subscribe to Legacy Family Tree, here, you’ll also receive the downloadable 24-page syllabus and you can watch any of the 1500+ webinars available at Legacy Family Tree Webinars anytime.

In 10 Ways to Find Your Native American Ancestor Using Y, Mitochondrial and Autosomal DNA, I covered the following features and how to use them for your genealogy:

  • Ethnicity – why it works and why it sometimes doesn’t
  • Ethnicity – how it works
  • Your Chromosomes – Mom and Dad
  • Ethnicity at AncestryDNA, 23andMe, FamilyTreeDNA and MyHeritage DNA
  • Genetic Communities at AncestryDNA
  • Genetic Groups at MyHeritage DNA
  • Painted ethnicity segments at 23andMe and FamilyTreeDNA
  • Painting ethnicity segments at DNAPainter – and why you want to
  • Shared ethnicity segments with your matches at AncestryDNA, 23andMe, FamilyTreeDNA and MyHeritage DNA
  • Downloading matches and segment files
  • Techniques to pinpoint Native Ancestors in your tree
  • Y DNA, Native ancestors and haplogroups
  • Mitochondrial DNA, Native ancestors and haplogroups
  • Creating a plan to find your Native ancestor
  • Strategies for finding test candidates
  • Your Ancestor DNA Pedigree Chart
  • Success!!!

If you haven’t yet tested at or uploaded your DNA to both FamilyTreeDNA and MyHeritage, you can find upload/download instructions, here, so that you can take advantage of the unique tools at all vendors.

Hope you enjoy the webinar and find those elusive ancestors!

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Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

DNA Purchases and Free Uploads

Genealogy Products and Services

Books

Genealogy Research

FamilyTreeDNA’s Chromosome Painting Just Arrived!!!

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FamilyTreeDNA’s long-anticipated chromosome painting for ethnicity results just arrived!

Videos and a White Paper!

Along with the release, Family TreeDNA has also provided several resources.

Dr. Paul Maier, Population Geneticist at FamilyTreeDNA created a three-part video series that explains MyOrigins V3 and the science behind the results – in normal language that air-breathing humans can understand. These are absolutely wonderful and only about 10 minutes each, so be sure to watch – in order!

MyOrigins 3.0 white paper that explains the science in more detail is here! If nothing else, at least skim and look at the pictures. It’s actually an amazing document.

Your Painted Results

To view your results, sign on to your account and click on Chromosome Painting!

Click on any image to enlarge

There it is – your beautiful new painted chromosomes with your Continental or Super Population results painted on your chromosomes!

Look, there are my AmerIndian segments, in pink.

What Can I Do?

You can download your segment file too – in the upper right-hand corner.

You can also download your segment match file found under the chromosome browser tab and sort your segments to see who matches you on these segments. I provided instructions, here.

Of course, you’ll see both sides, meaning paternal and maternal matches, so it will be necessary to determine on which “side” your segments of interest originate, and who matches you on that side of your tree.

We will discuss these strategies and how to implement them in future articles.

A little birdie tells me that DNAPainter will have an import soon so you can upload your chromosome painting file to integrate with your match painting.

Right now, just viewing and appreciating your chromosome art that represents our ancestors is amazing. Did you find any surprises? Who else wants to print and frame this?

If you don’t have results at FamilyTreeDNA, you can upload DNA results from the other three major testing companies and pay a $19 unlock to receive your very own chromosome painting. Upload/Download instructions are found here.

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Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

DNA Purchases and Free Transfers

Genealogy Products and Services

Books

Genealogy Research

DNA Beginnings: How Many DNA Matches Do I Have?

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People often want to know how many DNA matches they have.

Sounds simple, right?

At some vendors, the answer to this question is easy to find, and at others, not so much.

How do you locate this information at each of the four major vendors?

What else do you need to know?

I’ve written handy step-by-step instructions for each company!

Matches at FamilyTreeDNA

Sign on at FamilyTreeDNA and under autosomal results, click on Family Finder Matches.

At the top of the next page, you’ll see your total number of matches along with matches that FamilyTreeDNA has been able to assign maternally or paternally based on creating/uploading a tree and linking known matches to that tree in their proper place.

Your parents do NOT need to have tested for the maternal/paternal bucketing functionality, but you DO need to identify some relatives and link their tests to their place in your tree. It’s that easy. Instructions for linking can be found in the “Linking Matches on Your Tree” section of this article (click here), along with information about how that helps you, or here.

Obviously, if your parents have tested, that’s the best scenario. For people who don’t have that option, FamilyTreeDNA is the ONLY vendor that offers this type of feature if your parents have NOT tested.

At FamilyTreeDNA, I have 7313 total matches of which 3169 are paternal, 1402 are maternal and 6 are related to both parents.

Hint – your siblings, their children, your children, grandchildren, etc. will be related to you on both your paternal and maternal sides.

If you don’t have an autosomal DNA test at FamilyTreeDNA, you can upload one from Ancestry, 23andMe, or MyHeritage for free. Click here for instructions.

Matches at MyHeritage

At MyHeritage, sign on and click on DNA, then DNA Matches.

At the top of your matches page, you’ll see your total number of matches.

At MyHeritage, I have 14,082 matches.

Matches are not broken down maternally and paternally automatically, but I can filter my matches in a wide variety of ways, including shared matches with either parent if they have tested, or other relatives.

If you don’t have an autosomal DNA test at MyHeritage, you can transfer one from Ancestry, 23andMe, or FamilyTreeDNA for free. Click here to begin your upload to MyHeritage.

Click here for instructions about how to download a copy of your DNA file from other vendors.

Matches at Ancestry

At Ancestry, sign on and click on DNA, then DNA Matches.

On your matches page, at the top, you’ll see a number of function widgets. Look for “Shared DNA.”

Click the down arrow to expand the Shared DNA box and you’ll see the total number of matches, along with the breakdown between 4th cousins or closer and distant matches.

Sometimes the number of matches doesn’t show up which means Ancestry’s servers are too busy to calculate the number of matches. Refresh your screen or try again in a few minutes. This happens often to me and always makes me question my sanity:)

I have 53,435 matches at Ancestry, of which 4,102 are estimated to be 4th cousins or closer and 49,333 are more distant.

For close matches only, if your parents have tested at Ancestry, when possible, Ancestry tells you on each match if that person is associated with your father’s side or your mother’s side.

You can’t upload DNA files from other vendors to Ancestry, but you can download a copy of your DNA file from Ancestry and upload to either FamilyTreeDNA or MyHeritage. Click here for instructions.

You can also download a copy of your tree from Ancestry and upload it to either of those vendors, along with your DNA file for best results.

Matches at 23andMe

23andMe functions differently from the other vendors. They set a hard limit on the number of matches you receive.

That maximum number differs based on the test version you took and if you pay for a membership subscription that provides enhanced medical information along with advanced filters and the ability to have a maximum of 5000 matches.

In order to purchase the membership subscription, you need to take their most current V5 test. If you tested with an earlier product, you will need to repurchase, retest or upgrade your current test which means you’ll need to spit in the vial again.

Please note the words, “up to 5000 relatives,” in the 23andMe verbiage. They also say that’s “over 3 times what you get” with their test without a subscription.

23andMe handles things differently from any other vendor in the industry. They made changes recently which created quite a stir because they removed some capabilities from existing customers and made those functions part of their subscription model. You can read about that here and here.

The match limit on the current 23andMe V5 test, WITHOUT the subscription, is 1500. If you tested previously on earlier kits, V2-V4, 23andMe has reinstated your prior maximum match limit which was 2000.

So, here’s the maximum match summary for 23andMe:

  • Earlier kits (V2-V4) – 2000 maximum matches
  • Current V5 kit with no subscription – 1500 maximum matches
  • Current V5 kit with subscription – 5000 maximum matches

Except, that’s NOT the number of matches you’ll actually see.

23andMe handles matching differently too.

23andMe matches you with their other customers up to your maximum, whatever that is, then subtracts the people who have not opted-in to genealogy matching. Remember, 23andMe focuses on health, not genealogy, so not all of their customers want matching.

Therefore, you’ll NEVER see your total number of allowed matches, which is why 23andMe cleverly says you “get access to up to 5000 relatives.”

Let’s look at my V4 test at 23andMe. Sign on and click on Ancestry, then DNA Relatives. (Please note, Ancestry is not Ancestry the company, but at 23andMe means genealogy results as opposed to medical/health results.)

At the top of your DNA Relatives page, you’ll see your total number of matches, before any sorting filters are applied.

23andMe does not automatically assign matches maternally or paternally, but if your parents have tested AND opt-in to matching, then you can filter by people who also match either parent.

I have 1796 matches at 23andMe, which means that 204 or 11% of my matches have not opted-in to matching.

You can’t upload DNA files from other vendors to 23andMe, but you can download a copy of your DNA file from 23andMe and upload to either FamilyTreeDNA or MyHeritage where you will assuredly receive more matches. Click here for instructions.

Summary

Each vendor has its own unique set of features and operates differently. It’s not so much the number of matches you have, but if you have the RIGHT match to break through a particular brick wall or provide you with a previously unknown photo of a cherished family member.

I encourage everyone to fish in all 4 of these ponds by testing or uploading your DNA. Uploading and matching are both free. Advanced tools require a small one-time unlock fee, but it’s significantly less than testing again. You can find step-by-step instructions to walk you through the process, here.

Have fun!!!

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Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

DNA Purchases and Free Transfers

Genealogy Products and Services

Books

Genealogy Research

Nine Years and Future Plans – Happy Blogiversary

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Happy Blogiversary!

Yes, blogiversary is actually a real word for a blog’s birthday.

It’s DNAeXplained’s 9th birthday and I nearly forgot.

How could I???

What do you get a blog for its birthday anyway?

History and Changes

I remember the 4th of July holiday back in 2012 – although that seems like about two lifetimes ago now.

I was trying to learn how to use WordPress, my chosen blogging platform, and to become familiar enough with how everything worked so I wouldn’t embarrass myself.

On July 11, 2012, I published my first very short blog article, just saying hello and inviting people to subscribe and come along for the ride. And what a ride it has been as we begin our 10th year together.

I was explaining DNA topics so often that I figured if I wrote the answer once as an article with pictures and graphics, I could save myself (and lots of other people) a great deal of effort. I could just link my blog article and not have to retype everything.

Seemed like a great idea…right?

That worked then and still does, well…except for a couple of considerations:

  • Increasingly, people don’t seem to be interested in learning, just in receiving “an answer.” In other words, they often don’t bother to actually read articles. Or, in one woman’s words, “You didn’t answer my question. You just gave me something to read.” Sigh.

I’m mortified when I read some of the answers provided to people on social media – especially realizing that the person asking the question has no idea how to discern between an accurate answer and something else.

Doubt that? Try an experiment. Select any topic where you are an expert. Go to a social media group about that topic. Review the questions and resulting answers. Bash head on table.

  • Things change over time. We’ve learned a WHOLE LOT since 2012 in the genetic genealogy space. Every vendor platform has changed multiple times. New products have been introduced which obsolete older products and their articles. Some vendors and tools have disappeared and new ones have emerged. DNA has become a household word.

The Unexpected

Blogging has resulted in a few things I didn’t anticipate:

  • Sometimes, bloggers becoming targets. This is especially painful when it comes from within the community. Mostly, I refuse to give any of that oxygen. Their hatefulness is really not about me. Still, it was shocking and painful at first.
  • I receive between 500 and 1000 emails every single day. Yes, EVERY SINGLE DAY. That’s in addition to blog comments and social media communications. It’s overwhelming, even after deleting obvious spam. This also means that I don’t catch up, am chronically behind, and never really get a break. (This is a big reason why bloggers burn out.)

Communications

Communications fall into several categories:

  • Some emails/communications are people reaching out about my (our) ancestors. Obviously, those emails are always welcome and often make my day. 😊
  • Some people are saying thank you or offering suggestions that I sometimes utilize as future article topics. I appreciate those too.
  • Some people comment or participate in a discussion. Those just require a quick approval and I’m always glad to see people engaging.
  • Some people inquire about consulting services. At this point, I don’t accept private clients and no longer write Y and mitochondrial DNA reports for people. That could change in the future, but right now, I simply refer people to others who I know are qualified based on the topic of the request.
  • Many emails are from someone who wants something. For example – “I’d like to write a guest post for your blog.” Translated – “I’d like to use the platform you’ve developed over the past 9 years, and your followers, to benefit myself.” The answer is a resounding “NO”! Truthfully, I no longer respond to these. The delete key suffices. But I still have to read them.

Unchanged!

Some things have NOT changed:

  • I still love to explain and educate about the marriage of DNA and genealogy.
  • I still love to chase my ancestors.
  • No ad policy – you won’t see embedded ads in my articles. When bloggers allow ads, the ads provide revenue, but the blogger also risks a substandard product being displayed to their subscribers and visitors. There are sometimes relevant, curated, affiliate links within my articles for products that I use, but they never appear as an ad. I am not criticizing bloggers who do adopt the ad model – simply explaining to you why I don’t. And yes, I know I’m foregoing revenue with this decision, but I feel it’s the right thing to do.

Improvements

Almost every aspect of genetic genealogy has improved over the past 9 years:

  • Autosomal test matches have increased and are often of a higher quality as a result of millions of people having tested at the four major vendors: FamilyTreeDNA, MyHeritage, 23andMe, and Ancestry. We probably had an industry-wide total of about 2 million testers in 2012, and now I’d wager we have more than 40 million. More and better matches for everyone!
  • Y DNA testing (for men only) has improved by leaps and bounds, with a combination of SNP testing with the Big Y-700 test and STR testing being able to refine relationships at a very granular level. This paternal line test plus matching is only available at FamilyTreeDNA.
  • Mitochondrial DNA test numbers lag behind other tests, but the Million Mito Project will encourage more testers and refine mitochondrial match results in a meaningful way as well. We simply need more testers, just like we did with autosomal back in 2012. The mitochondrial DNA full sequence test is available at FamilyTreeDNA.
  • Every major DNA vendor has added state-of-the-art, innovative tools over the years.
  • Every major DNA vendor has been sold/acquired and we’ve all managed to survive, despite teeth-gnashing and predictions of doom.
  • FamilyTreeDNA and MyHeritage both accept transfers/uploads from other vendors, making swimming in all the genetic genealogy pools easier and more affordable for consumers. Click here for step-by-step download/upload instructions.
  • Public consciousness about DNA testing for genealogy, health, and traits has increased dramatically. We see TV and social media ads regularly today.
  • Techniques like triangulation, clustering, and various flavors of tree-matching have revolutionized what can be accomplished with genetic genealogy – both confirming and discovering ancestors. Newly discovered new cousins may be researching the same ancestral lines.
  • People seeking the identity of parents or other close relatives routinely solve those puzzles today, thanks to the millions of people who have tested. That was quite rare in 2012.
  • We are attracting a whole new savvy generation of testers who grew up with and understand technology.

The Future

What does the future hold for me and DNAeXplain? To be clear, DNAeXplain is the underlying business/website and DNAeXplained.com is the blog, but I often use them interchangeably since both URLs resolve to the same location today.

First and foremost, I don’t have any intention of stopping. I’m passionate about genetic genealogy, have been for 21 years now, and love to write articles and share with you. In fact, in the last few months, I’ve added the Y DNA Resources one-stop educational page as well as Mitochondrial DNA.

I’ve had the opportunity to get to know and meet so many blog followers. Some of you turned out to be cousins. Of course, we’re all related eventually, someplace back in time.

I look forward to in-person conferences again, but don’t worry – I’ll continue researching, writing, and covering topics in this amazing industry.

Cousin Bait

I never considered that I might find cousins through blogging but that’s worked marvelously – both when I publish the articles and later too.

On a personal level, my 52 Ancestors series has been extremely successful for a couple of reasons:

  • Each article forces me to verify and update my research.
  • The articles act as cousin bait. Not only are they findable using Google, or the blog search feature, I post the article links at WikiTree, MyHeritage, and Ancestry on the profile card for that ancestor. I need to do the same at FamilySearch as well.

Upcoming Book

I’m very excited to be able to share with you that I’m completing a manuscript.

I can’t discuss more about the book just yet, but I should have the draft to the editor shortly.

Chapters

The book of our life is written in chapters, just like the lives of our ancestors were.

I’m beginning a new chapter shortly – a move to someplace where it’s warmer.

I don’t know where just yet (I think a villa in Tuscany is probably out of the question), nor exactly when.

What I do know is that I’ve accumulated a HUGE amount of stuff over the decades that I’ve lived in this house. My mother passed away, so I have her things too.

Genealogy books are heavy and require lots of space.

So does paper, as in file cabinets and boxes of documents.

As most of you know, I’m a quilter – and fabric is heavy and requires space too.

Movers charge by some combination of distance, how much space your possessions require in their truck, hourly fees, weight and prep required.

Let’s just say that preparing to move is proving challenging!

Why am I telling you this?

Changes

Over the period of 9 years, I’ve written and published 1442 articles. That equates to one article about every 2.25 days.

That’s even hard for me to believe.

My goal has always been to publish:

  • One technical article during the week. Topics include things like DNA concepts, sales, new features, and various “how-to” articles.
  • One 52-Ancestors article each weekend.

I’ve exceeded that goal.

Needless to say, both of those types of articles take hours-to-days to research, compose and publish.

During these next few months as I’m migrating from one part of the country to another, and one chapter of my life to the next, I may miss my goal of publishing the 52-ancestors article each week. I’ve already compiled the easy ones given that the next one will be number 338.

Those articles require a significant amount of research and right now, I need to focus on reducing the file cabinets and bookshelves of stuff. And of course, like any genealogist, I have to sift through everything one paper at a time to be sure I’m not disposing of something I’ll regret – like, you know, my high school report card. 😊

It’s very difficult to not run down every rabbit hole! Hey, what is my friend in that picture beside me at the football game up to now? Oops, an obituary. What about my co-worker that I had a crush on? What do they look like? Who was sitting at the picnic table in that family reunion picture anyway? I don’t remember them. You get the drift.

The message for you here is “don’t worry.” Some of those emails and messages are from people who care about me and are checking in to be sure nothing is wrong when I miss publishing an article on my long-established schedule. I really appreciate their concern and have been incredibly fortunate to connect with so many wonderful people.

A year from now, we’ll be celebrating DNAeXplain’s 10-year birthday. I hope to be happily settled and writing prolifically again in a new office in a yet-to-be-selected distant location, experiencing an exciting new chapter of life. Maybe I’ll just take you along on that adventure through the power of storytelling! Don’t we wish our ancestors had done that?

It’s going to be a very, very interesting year!!!

_____________________________________________________________

Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

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Genealogy Research

FamilyTreeDNA Relaunch – New Feature Overview

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The brand-new FamilyTreeDNA website is live!

I’m very pleased with the investment that FamilyTreeDNA has made in their genealogy platform and tools. This isn’t just a redesign, it’s more of a relaunch.

I spoke with Dr. Lior Rauchberger, CEO of myDNA, the parent company of FamilyTreeDNA briefly yesterday. He’s excited too and said:

“The new features and enhancements we are releasing in July are the first round of updates in our exciting product roadmap. FamilyTreeDNA will continue to invest heavily in the advancement of genetic genealogy.”

In other words, this is just the beginning.

In case you were wondering, all those features everyone asked for – Lior listened.

Lior said earlier in 2021 that he was going to do exactly this and he’s proven true to his word, with this release coming just half a year after he took the helm. Obviously, he hit the ground running.

A few months ago, Lior said that his initial FamilyTreeDNA focus was going to be on infrastructure, stability, and focusing on the customer experience. In other words, creating a foundation to build on.

The new features, improvements, and changes are massive and certainly welcome.

I’ll be covering the new features in a series of articles, but in this introductory article, I’m providing an overview so you can use it as a guide to understand and navigate this new release.

Change is Challenging

I need to say something here.

Change is hard. In fact, change is the most difficult challenge for humans. We want improvements, yet we hate it when the furniture is rearranged in our “room.” However, we can’t have one without the other.

So, take a deep breath, and let’s view this as a great new adventure. These changes and tools will provide us with a new foundation and new clues. Think of this as finding long-lost documents in an archive about your ancestors. If someone told me that there is a potential for discovering the surname of one of my elusive female ancestors in an undiscovered chest in a remote library, trust me, I’d be all over it – regardless of where it was or how much effort I had to expend to get there. In this case, I can sit right here in front of my computer and dig for treasure.

We just need to learn to navigate the new landscape in a virtual room. What a gift!

Let’s start with the first thing you’ll see – the main page when you sign in.

Redesigned Main Page

The FamilyTreeDNA main page has changed. To begin with, the text is darker and the font is larger across the entire platform. OMG, thank you!!!

The main page has been flipped left to right, with results on the left now. Projects, surveys, and other information, along with haplogroup badges are on the right. Have you answered any surveys? I don’t think I even noticed them before. (My bad!)

Click any image to enlarge.

The top tabs have changed too. The words myTree and myProjects are now gone, and descriptive tabs have replaced those. The only “my” thing remaining is myOrigins. This change surprises me with myDNA being the owner.

The Results & Tools tab at the top shows the product dropdowns.

The most popular tabs are shown individually under each product, with additional features being grouped under “See More.”

Every product now has a “See More” link where less frequently used widgets will be found, including the raw data downloads. This is the Y DNA “See More” dropdown by way of example.

You can see the green Updated badge on the Family Finder Matches tab. I don’t know if that badge will always appear when customers have new matches, or if it’s signaling that all customers have updated Family Finder Matches now.

We’ll talk about matches in the Family Finder section.

The Family Finder “See More” tab includes the Matrix, ancientOrigins, and the raw data file download.

The mitochondrial DNA section, titled Maternal Line Ancestry, mtDNA Results and Tools includes several widgets grouped under the “See More” tab.

Additional Tests and Tools

The Additional Tests and Tools area includes a link to your Family Tree (please do upload or create one,) Public Haplotrees, and Advanced Matches.

Public haplotrees are free-to-the-public Y and mitochondrial DNA trees that include locations. They are also easily available to FamilyTreeDNA customers here.

Please note that you access both types of trees from one location after clicking the Public Haplotrees page. The tree defaults to Y-DNA, but just click on mtDNA to view mitochondrial haplogroups and locations. Both trees are great resources because they show the location flags of the earliest known ancestors of the testers within each haplogroup.

Advanced Matches used to be available from the menu within each test type, but since advanced matching includes all three types of tests, it’s now located under the Additional Tests and Tools banner. Don’t forget about Advanced Matches – it’s really quite useful to determine if someone matches you on multiple types of tests and/or within specific projects.

Hey, look – I found a tooltip. Just mouse over the text and tabs on various pages to see where tooltips have been added.

Help and Help Center

The new Help Center is debuting in this release. The former Learning Center is transitioning to the Help Center with new, updated content.

Here’s an example of the new easy-to-navigate format. There’s a search function too.

Each individual page, test type, and section on your personal home page has a “Helpful Information” button.

On the main page, at the top right, you’ll see a new Help button.

Did you see that Submit Feedback link?

If you click on the Help Center, you’ll be greeted with context-sensitive help.

I clicked through from the dashboard, so that’s what I’m seeing. However, other available topics are shown at left.

I clicked on both of the links shown and the content has been updated with the new layout and features. No wonder they launched a new Help Center!

Account Settings

Account settings are still found in the same place, and those pages don’t appear to have changed. However, please keep in mind that some settings make take up to 24 hours to take effect.

Family Finder Rematching

Before we look at what has changed on your Family Finder pages, let’s talk about what happened behind the scenes.

FamilyTreeDNA has been offering the Family Finder test for 11 years, one of two very early companies to enter that marketspace. We’ve learned so much since then, not only about DNA itself, but about genetic genealogy, matching, triangulation, population genetics, how to use these tools, and more.

In order to make improvements, FamilyTreeDNA changing the match criteria which necessitated rematching everyone to everyone else.

If you have a technology background of any type, you’ll immediately realize that this is a massive, expensive undertaking requiring vast computational resources. Not only that, but the rematching has to be done in tandem with new kits coming in, coordinated for all customers, and rolled out at once. Based on new matches and features, the user interface needed to be changed too, at the same time.

Sounds like a huge headache, right?

Why would a company ever decide to undertake that, especially when there is no revenue for doing so? The answer is to make functionality and accuracy better for their customers. Think of this as a new bedrock foundation for the future.

FamilyTreeDNA has made computational changes and implemented several features that require rematching:

  • Improved matching accuracy, in particular for people in highly endogamous populations. People in this category have thousands of matches that occur simply because they share multiple distant ancestors from within the same population. That combination of multiple common ancestors makes their current match relationships appear to be closer in time than they are. In order to change matching algorithms, FamilyTreeDNA had to rewrite their matching software and then run matching all over to enable everyone to receive new, updated match results.
  • FamilyTreeDNA has removed segments below 6 cM following sustained feedback from the genealogical community.
  • X matching has changed as well and no longer includes anyone as an X match below 6 cM.
  • Family Matching, meaning paternal, maternal and both “bucketing” uses triangulation behind the scenes. That code also had to be updated.
  • Older transfer kits used to receive only closer matches because imputation was not in place when the original transfer/upload took place. All older kits have been imputed now and matched with the entire database, which is part of why you may have more matches.
  • Relationship range calculations have changed, based on the removal of microsegments, new matching methodology and rematching results.
  • FamilyTreeDNA moved to hg37, known as Build 37 of the human genome. In layman’s terms, as scientists learn about our DNA, the human map of DNA changes and shifts slightly. The boundary lines change somewhat. Versions are standardized so all researchers can use the same base map or yardstick. In some cases, early genetic genealogy implementers are penalized because they will eventually have to rematch their entire database when they upgrade to a new build version, while vendors who came to the party later won’t have to bear that internal expense.

As you can see, almost every aspect of matching has changed, so everyone was rematched against the entire database. You’ll see new results. Some matches may be gone, especially distant matches or if you’re a member of an endogamous population.

You’ll likely have new matches due to older transfer kits being imputed to full compatibility. Your matches should be more accurate too, which makes everyone happy.

I understand a white paper is being written that will provide more information about the new matching algorithms.

Ok, now let’s check out the new Family Finder Matches page.

Family Finder Matches

FamilyTreeDNA didn’t just rearrange the furniture – there’s a LOT of new content.

First, a note. You’ll see “Family Finder” in some places, and “Autosomal DNA” in other places. That’s one and the same at FamilyTreeDNA. The Family Finder test is their autosomal test, named separately because they also have Y DNA and mitochondrial DNA tests.

When you click on Family Finder matches for the first time, you will assuredly notice one thing and will probably notice a second.

First, you’ll see a little tour that explains how to use the various new tools.

Secondly, you will probably see the “Generating Matches” notice for a few seconds to a few minutes while your match list is generated, especially if the site is busy because lots of people are signing on. I saw this message for maybe a minute or two before my match list filled.

This should be a slight delay, but with so many people signing in right now, my second kit took longer. If you receive a message that says you have no matches, just refresh your page. If you had matches before, you DO have matches now.

While working with the new interface this morning, I’ve found that refreshing the screen is the key to solving issues.

My kits that have a few thousand matches loaded Family Matching (bucketing) immediately, but this (Jewish) kit that has around 30,000 matches received this informational message instead. FamilyTreeDNA has removed the little spinning icon. If you mouse over the information, you’ll see the following message:

This isn’t a time estimate. Everyone receives the same message. The message didn’t even last long enough for me to get a screenshot on the first kit that received this message. The results completed within a minute or so. The Family Matching buckets will load as soon as the parental matching is ready.

These delays should only happen the first time, or if someone has a lot of matches that they haven’t yet viewed. Once you’ve signed in, your matches are cached, a technique that improves performance, so the loading should be speedy, or at least speedier, during the second and subsequent visits.

Of course, right now, all customers have an updated match list, so there’s something new for everyone.

Getting Help

Want to see that tutorial again?

Click on that little Help box in the upper right-hand corner. You can view the Tutorial, look at Quick References that explain what’s on this page, visit the Help Center or Submit Feedback.

Two Family Finder Matches Views – Detail and Table

The first thing you’ll notice is that there are two views – Detail View and Table View. The default is Detail View.

Take a minute to get used to the new page.

Detail View – Filter Matches by Match Type

I was pleased to see new filter buttons, located in several places on the page.

The Matches filter at left allows you to display only specific relationship levels, including X-Matches which can be important in narrowing matches to a specific subset of ancestors.

You can display only matches that fall within certain relationship ranges. Note the new “Remote Relative” that was previously called speculative.

Parental Matching and Filtering by Test Type or Trees

All of your matches are displayed by default, of course, but you can click on Paternal, Maternal or Both, like before to view only matches in those buckets. In order for the Family Matching bucketing feature to be enabled, you must attach known relatives’ DNA matches to their proper place in your tree.

Please note that I needed to refresh the page a couple of times to get my parental matches to load the first time. I refreshed a couple of times to be sure that all of my bucketed matches loaded. This should be a first-time loading blip.

There’s a new filter button to the right of the bucketing tabs.

You can now filter by who has trees and who has taken which kinds of tests.

You can apply multiple filters at the same time to further narrow your matches.

Important – Clearing Filters

It’s easy to forget you have a filter enabled. This section is important, in part because Clear Filter is difficult to find.

The clear filter button does NOT appear until you’ve selected a filter. However, after applying that filter, to clear it and RESET THE MATCHES to unfiltered, you need to click on the “Clear Filter” button which is located at the top of the filter selections, and then click “Apply” at the bottom of the menu. I looked for “clear filter” forever before finding it here.

You’re welcome😊

Enhanced Search

Thank goodness, the search functionality has been enhanced and simplified too. Full name search works, both here and on the Y DNA search page.

If you type in a surname without selecting any search filters, you’ll receive a list of anyone with that word in their name, or in their list of ancestral surnames. This does NOT include surnames in their tree if they have not added those surnames to their list of ancestral surnames.

Notice that your number of total matches and bucketed people will change based on the results of this search and any filters you have applied.

I entered Estes in the search box, with no filters. You can see that I have a total of 46 matches that contain Estes in one way or another, and how they are bucketed.

Estes is my birth surname. I noticed that three people with Estes in their information are bucketed maternally. This is the perfect example of why you can’t assume a genetic relationship based on only a surname. Those three people’s DNA matches me on my mother’s side. And yes, I confirmed that they matched my mother too on that same segment or segments.

Search Filters

You can also filter by haplogroup. This is very specific. If you select mitochondrial haplogroup J, you will only receive Family Finder matches that have haplogroup J, NOT J1 or J1c or J plus anything.

If you’re looking for your own haplogroup, you’ll need to type your full haplogroup in the search box and select mtDNA Haplogroup in the search filter dropdown.

Resetting Search Results

To dismiss search results, click on the little X. It’s easy to forget that you have initiated a search, so I need to remember to dismiss searches after I’m finished with each one.

Export Matches

The “Export CSV” button either downloads your entire match list, or the list of filtered matches currently selected. This is not your segment information, but a list of matches and related information such as which side they are bucketed on, if any, notes you’ve made, and more.

Your segment information is available for download on the chromosome browser.

Sort By

The Sort By button facilitates sorting your matches versus filtering your matches. Filters ONLY display the items requested, while sorts display all of the items requested, sorting them in a particular manner.

You can sort in any number of ways. The default is Relationship Range followed by Shared DNA.

Your Matches – Detail View

A lot has changed, but after you get used to the new interface, it makes more sense and there are a lot more options available which means increased flexibility. Remember, you can click to enlarge any of these images.

To begin with, you can see the haplogroups of your matches if they have taken a Y or mitochondrial DNA test. If you match someone, you’ll see a little check in the haplogroup box. I’m not clear whether this means you’re a haplogroup match or that person is on your match list.

To select people to compare in the chromosome browser, you simply check the little square box to the left of their photo and the chromosome browser box pops up at the bottom of the page. We’ll review the chromosome browser in a minute.

The new Relationship Range prediction is displayed, based on new calculations with segments below 6 cM removed. The linked relationship is displayed below the range.

A linked relationship occurs when you link that person to their proper place in your tree. If you have no linked relationship, you’ll see a link to “assign relationship” which takes you to your tree to link this person if you know how you are related.

The segments below 6 cM are gone from the Shared DNA total and X matches are only shown if they are 6 cM or above.

In Common With and Not In Common With

In Common With and Not In Common With is the little two-person icon at the right.

Just click on the little person icon, then select “In Common With” to view your shared matches between you, that match, and other people. The person you are viewing matches in common with is highlighted at the top of the page, with your common matches below.

You can stack filters now. In this example, I selected my cousin, Don, to see our common matches. I added the search filter of the surname Ferverda, my mother’s maiden name. She is deceased and I manage her kit. You can see that my cousin Don and I have 5 total common matches – four maternal and one both, meaning one person matches me on both my maternal and paternal lines.

It’s great news that now Cousin Don pops up in the chromosome browser box at the bottom, enabling easy confusion-free chromosome segment comparisons directly from the In Common With match page. I love this!!!.

All I have to do now is click on other people and then on Compare Relationship which pushes these matches through to the chromosome browser. This is SOOOO convenient.

You’ll see a new tree icon at right on each match. A dark tree means there’s content and a light tree means this person does not have a tree. Remember, you can filter by trees with content using the filter button beside “Both”.

Your notes are shown at far right. Any person with a note is dark grey and no note is white.

If you’re looking for the email contact information, click on your match’s name to view their placard which also includes more detailed ancestral surname information.

Family Finder – Table View

The table view is very similar to the Detail View. The layout is a bit different with more matches visible in the same space.

This view has lots of tooltips on the column heading bar! Tooltips are great for everyone, but especially for people just beginning to find their way in the genetic genealogy world.

I’ll have to experiment a bit to figure out which view I prefer. I’d like to be able to set my own default for whichever view I want as my default. In fact, I think I’ll submit that in the “Submit Feedback” link. For every suggestion, I’m going to find something really positive to say. This was an immense overhaul.

Chromosome Browser

Let’s look at the chromosome Browser.

You can arrive at the Chromosome Browser by selecting people on your match page, or by selecting the Chromosome Browser under the Results and Tools link.

Everything is pretty much the same on the chromosome browser, except the default view is now 6 cM and the smaller segments are gone. You can also choose to view only segments above 10 cM.

If you have people selected in the chromosome browser and click on Download Segments in the upper right-hand corner, it downloads the segments of only the people currently selected.

You can “Clear All” and then click on Download All Segments which downloads your entire segment file. To download all segments, you need to have no people selected for comparison.

The contents of this file are greatly reduced as it now contains only the segments 6 cM and above.

Family Tree

No, the family tree has not changed, and yes, it needs to, desperately. Trust me, the management team is aware and I suspect one of the improvements, hopefully sooner than later, will be an improved tree experience.

Y DNA

The Y DNA page has received an update too, adding both a Detail View and a Table View with the same basic functionality as the Family Finder matching above. If you are reading this article for Y DNA only, please read the Family Finder section to understand the new layout and features.

Like previously, the match comparison begins at the 111 marker level.

However, there’s a BIG difference. If there are no matches at this level, YOU NEED TO CLICK THE NEXT TAB. You can easily see that this person has matches at the 67 level and below, but the system no longer “counts down” through the various levels until it either finds a level with a match or reaches 12 markers.

If you’re used to the old interface, it’s easy to think you’re at the final destination of 12 markers with no matches when you’re still at 111.

Y DNA Detail View

The Y-DNA Detail and Table views features are the same as Family Finder and are described in that section.

The new format is quite different. One improvement is that the Paternal Country of Origin is now displayed, along with a flag. How cool is that!

The Paternal Earliest Known Ancestor and Match Date are at far right. Note that match dates have been reset to the rerun date. At this point, FamilyTreeDNA is evaluating the possibility of restoring the original match date. Regardless, you’ll be able to filter for match dates when new matches arrive.

Please check to be sure you have your Country of Origin, Earliest Known Ancestor, and mapped location completed and up to date.

Earliest Known Ancestor

If you haven’t completed your Earliest Known Ancestor (EKA) information, now’s the perfect time. It’s easy, so let’s do it before you forget.

Click on the Account Settings gear beneath your name in the right-hand upper corner. Click on Genealogy, then on Earliest Known Ancestors and complete the information in the red boxes.

  • Direct paternal line means your father’s father’s father’s line – as far up through all fathers as you can reach. This is your Y DNA lineage, but females should complete this information on general principles.
  • Direct maternal line means your mother’s mother’s mother’s line – as far up through all mothers that you can reach. This is your mitochondrial DNA lineage, so relevant for both males and females.

Completing all of the information, including the location, will help you and your matches as well when using the Matches Map.

Be sure to click Save when you’re finished.

Y DNA Filters

Y DNA has more filter options than autosomal.

The Y DNA filter, located to the right of the 12 Markers tab allows testers to filter by:

  • Genetic distance, meaning how many mutations difference between you and your matches
  • Groups meaning group projects that the tester has joined
  • Tree status
  • Match date
  • Level of test taken

If none of your matches have taken the 111 marker test or you don’t match anyone at that level, that test won’t show up on your list.

Y DNA Table View

As with Family Finder, the Table View is more condensed and additional features are available on the right side of each match. For details, please review the Family Finder section.

If you’re looking for the old Y DNA TiP report, it’s now at the far right of each match.

The actual calculator hasn’t changed yet. I know people were hoping for the new Y DNA aging in this release, but that’s yet to follow.

Other Pages

Other pages like the Big Y and Mitochondrial DNA did not receive new features or functionality in this release, but do sport new user-friendly tooltips.

I lost track, but I counted over 100 tooltips added across the platform, and this is just the beginning.

There are probably more new features and functionality that I haven’t stumbled across just yet.

And yes, we are going to find a few bugs. That’s inevitable with something this large. Please report anything you find to FamilyTreeDNA.

Oh wait – I almost forgot…

New Videos

I understand that there are in the ballpark of 50 new videos that are being added to the new Help Center, either today or very shortly.

When I find out more, I’ll write an article about what videos are available and where to find them. People learn in various ways. Videos are often requested and will be a popular addition. I considered making videos, but that’s almost impossible for anyone besides the vendor because the names on screens either need to be “fake” or the screen needs to be blurred.

So hurray – very glad to hear these are imminent!

Stay Tuned

Stay tuned for new developments. As Lior said, FamilyTreeDNA is investing heavily in genetic genealogy and there’s more to come.

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How Many Men Discover or Confirm Their Surname with Y DNA Testing?

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About 15 years ago, Bennett Greenspan, founder of FamilyTreeDNA, at one of the early conferences said that about 30% of men who take a Y DNA test find a strong surname match. That number has increased now to nearly 100%, or “almost everyone.”

Exceptions

Of course, there are exceptions that fall into a number of categories:

  • Jewish families from regions where surnames weren’t adopted until in the 1800s.
  • Jewish families whose direct paternal line suffered dramatic losses during the Holocaust.
  • Dutch families who did not adopt surnames until Napoleon’s edict in 1811.
  • Cultures who have or recently had patronymic surnames that change every generation.
  • Men whose DNA is either extremely rare (and no relatives have tested) or are from under-sampled regions of the world.
  • Males whose paternal line may be recent immigrants and people in the homeland don’t participate in genealogy or don’t DNA test.
  • Males whose ancestors were enslaved. In the US, families adopted surnames after the Civil War ended slavery in the 1860s, so Y DNA testing plus autosomal is critically important to reunite these families. Please note that the Y DNA haplogroup, even an estimate provided with STR testing, will indicate whether the direct paternal lineage is European, African, Native American/Asian – all of which are found in the descendants of men who were enslaved. The Big Y-700 provides significantly more information along with placement on the haplotree.

I started writing Y DNA reports for clients in 2004 (although I no longer accept private clients) and at that time, often saw men with no matches. Today, a man with no matches is extremely unusual, and most have strong surname matches. As more men test, everyone will have more matches, of course, and the more we can learn about our ancestors.

What do matches reveal?

Matches Reveal

In essence, matches to other men with common surnames do one of two things:

  1. Confirm the surname lineage, at least to the common ancestor.
  2. Identify the surname where the tester is likely to find his ancestral roots.
  3. Provide perspective further back in time answering the question, “Where did I come from?”

Of course, this second point is crucial for males searching for the identity of their paternal lines.

While time has moved on, the number of testers in the database has dramatically increased, and almost everyone has relevant matches now – I still see the 30% metric oft-repeated. Let’s put this to the test and see what we find.

Setting Up the Experiment

I selected 20 men who have taken the Big Y test whose kits I manage or who were randomly selected from projects that I manage and who have given permission for their results to be published on public project pages.

I recorded results for the tester’s own or very similar surnames. Slightly different but recognizable spellings are counted as the same name.

I included matches at 12 markers, 111 markers, and the Big Y results. Men who purchase or upgrade to the Big Y-700 test will have all 111 STR panel markers included. Obviously, individual testers should check their results at every level.

Big Y testers actually receive 700+ STR markers, but can only easily filter for matches at 111 (or below), so that’s the number I used. Plus, males can purchase  37 and 111 panels without taking the Big Y test, so this comparative information will be valid for all Y DNA testers.

Click to enlarge image.

Additionally, I used the Advanced Matches feature to check for people who match someone on BOTH the Y DNA and their Family Finder autosomal test. Of course, this doesn’t guarantee that the reason they match on both tests is because of their common surname line – but it’s a hint and may be very useful, especially with closer Family Finder matches.

I intentionally included some men with recent European heritage who are unlikely to have matches simply because their families have been in colonial America since the 1600s or 1700s and their ancestor had a dozen sons who each had a dozen sons.

Why Did I Include 12 Marker Results?

You may wonder why I included 12 marker matches since that test is no longer sold individually and is the least granular. Truthfully, it’s too often deemed useless and overlooked.

Hear me out on this one😊

Many of the men who originally took the 12 and 25 marker tests, before the higher panels (37, 67, 111, and Big Y) were available are deceased now. Twenty years is a generation, and FamilyTreeDNA began testing the Y chromosome in the year 2000.

While these low marker tests alone are not conclusive, with additional information, such as trees, common ancestors, and other testers who match, they form pieces of evidence that can be invaluable. Some have also taken an autosomal test which can be especially important, given that they are another generation or two (or three) further back in time than the people testing today.

You won’t see these men as matches at 37, 67 or 111 markers, because they are deceased and can’t upgrade, but they may provide the nugget of information you need by matching at 12 or 25 markers. You’ll need to evaluate that match in light of other information. I’ll review that in the next two sections.

20 Men

If you’re a man or can find a male to test for each of your genealogy lines, the Y DNA is the fastest, most reliable way to identify an ancestral surname – not just in your father’s generation, but moving back in time.

Of the 20 men selected, all men had matches to their surname. However, one Smith man, #18, had a unique situation that might be very genealogically relevant.

I’ll discuss each match briefly with some commentary below the chart.

Surname Match Name 12 Marker 111 Marker Big Y Advanced – 12 + FF Both
1 Howery Howery 9 of 20 2 of 2 0 (none tested) 1
2 Graves Graves 8 of 51 2 of 8 1 Graves + others 1 – different surname
3 Perkins Perkins/McDonald 16 of 1762 1 of 63, many McDonalds 0 Perkins (no testers) but several McD names 8 – 2 McDonald
4 Napier Napier 19 of 19,217 2 of 13 2 Napier + others 1 + many others
5 Rice Rice 45 of 58 14 of 19 7 of 10 1
6 Rader Rader  13 of 18,576 7 of 7 7 3
7 Estes Estes 69 of 502 21 of 24 9 of 10 2 + 4 different surname
8 Campbell Campbell 178 of 369 61 of 103 7 of 10 4 of 5
9 Lentz Lentz 1 of 1 0 of 1 1 different name, no other Lentz Big Y testers 0
10 Bonnevie Bonnevie 1 of 1 (tested to 37) 0 0 no test
11 Vannoy Vannoy 7 of 49 2 of 4 0 of 1 0
12 Lore/Lord Lore/Lord 3 of 7 1 of 3 1 of 1 0
13 Clarkson/Claxton Clarkson/Claxton 19 of 540 1 of 1 0 of 9 (No Big Y testers) 0 of 3
14 Muncey Muncy/Muncey 9 of 155 7 of 16 1 of 4 1
15 Miller Miller 5 of 6 2 at 67, no 111 testers 0 – no Miller match testers 1 of 2
16 Speak(s) Speak(s) 9 of 9 21 of 51 4 of 17 0
17 Smith Smith/Jennings 2 of 16, 9 Jennings 0 of 2 (Jennings) 1 Jennings of 3 1 Jennings
18 Bolton Bolton 8 of 1750 2 of 2 0 of 28 0 of 12
19 Crumley Crumley 10 of 79 7 of 93 3 of 127 0 of 2
20 Harrell Harrell 81 of 17,638 3 of 7 2 of 2 0 of 119

Messages Revealed in the Results

Let’s briefly review the information we’ve discovered and extrapolate from each of these 20 matches. Analysis is the key to success.

  1. The Howery surname is rather unusual. This man had only two 111 marker matches and both were to men of the same surname. Half of his 12 marker matches are the same surname. None of his matches had taken the Big Y test, so he has no same-surname or other surname matches there. He did match one of his Y DNA matches on the Family Finder test though. This is high-quality confirmation that Howery is indeed the biological ancestral surname and our tester can set about finding and confirming his common ancestors with his matches.
  2. The Graves male had several 12-marker matches, but many 12-marker matches have not tested at the 111 marker level. He matches one Graves male on the Big Y plus some men with other surnames. The Big Y reaches back further in time, so these matches may reflect common ancestors before the advent of surnames.
  3. Our Perkins male has very interesting matches. He does have both 12 and 111 Perkins matches, but he also had a LOT of McDonald matches. More McDonald matches than Perkins matches. This suggests that indeed, his ancestors were Perkins, at least back to the earliest known ancestor (EKA), but before that, he may well be a member of the McDonald Y DNA clan. There were no Perkins Big Y testers, but if I were him, I’d ask my Perkins matches to upgrade.
  4. I can tell by looking at the huge number of 12 marker matches for our Napier man that he is haplogroup R, the most common in Europe, with an EXTREMELY common 12 marker haplotype. Note how dramatically the number of 111 marker matches drops – from 19,000+ to 13 – a perfect example of why we suggest men upgrade to at least 111 markers to refine their matches. Both of his 111 marker Napier matches have upgraded to the Big Y, and he matches them there as well. He does match one Napier on both the 12 marker test and Family Finder Advanced Matching – but he also matches MANY other men. This is because of the extremely high number of 12 marker matches. In his case, I would only use Y DNA marker panels higher than 12 markers in the Advanced Matching.
  5. Lots of Rice testers from this line confirm a common ancestor. I wonder if there is a Rice male from someplace overseas who has tested. If so, this might be that “jump the pond” event that genealogists who have European ancestors who are found in colonial America seek.
  6. Our Rader tester also has many 12 marker matches, but his only matches at 111 and on the Big Y are his Rader kinsmen. No doubt about that surname whatsoever.
  7. My Estes line has several 12 marker matches, but that gets slimmed right down at 111 markers. Using the Big Y test, we further divided those branches of Estes men. I literally could not have sorted out who was descended from whom without the Big Y test results. Way too many Johns, Williams, and Elishas in burned counties in Virginia.
  8. Our Campbell tester is unquestionably confirmed to be descended from the Clan Campbell line from Inverary, Scotland. However, the challenge in this family is which Campbell male they descend from in Virginia. The Big Y-700 test has narrowed the possibilities significantly, and the tester is currently in the process of attempting to convince his three closest Y STR 111 matches to take the Big Y test. Yes, he has offered to pay as well. Hey, in genealogy, you do what you need to do. Y DNA is likely the only way this puzzle from the 1700s will ever be unraveled.
  9. The Lentz line is German with rare DNA, but they do have a confirming match to another Lentz male.
  10. Bonnievie spelled various ways is French and has one 12 marker match who only tested to 37 markers. He has no matches above that. Not only is his Y DNA quite rare, DNA testing is illegal in France which makes additional testers few and far between. Unfortunately, his one match has not taken a Family Finder test either.
  11. Several men from the Vannoy line have tested and a Big Y test match to another man confirmed that the ancestral line is Dutch – not French as was speculated for decades. The STR tests have revealed Vannoy lines, by similar spellings, from lines we didn’t know existed.
  12. Lore or Lord is a rare Acadian family surname. Our tester does have matches to other Lore/Lord men, which confirms the line to the ancestor who arrived in Acadia in the early 1600s, but future testers will be needed before we can confirm his origins to either France or as one of the English soldiers who served at the fort.
  13. The Clarkson/Claxton testers confirm two lines, one spelled each way, from Tennessee and North Carolina line to a common ancestor in either Virginia or North Carolina in the 1770s. However, the family is still working to further assemble that puzzle. Finding a Clarkson/Claxton match on STR markers or the Big Y who descends from a male not from the two known lines would help immensely. Our hope is that a Clarkson/Claxton from an earlier line or from the British Isles will test and provide that push over the brick wall. Any Clarkson/Clarkson men out there who haven’t taken the Y DNA test yet?
  14. The Muncy/Munsey line is confirmed to a common ancestor born in England in and died on Long Island in 1674. Based on both STR and SNP results from the Big Y, we can narrow the lineages of Muncy men who test and aren’t familiar with their Muncy genealogy. Of course, the Muncy line eventually migrated through Virginia and seemingly named every man in every generation either John, Samuel or Francis – but DNA testing helps immensely to sort this out.
  15. While Miller is a very common occupation surname, DNA testing has put to rest many incorrect myths about this particular Swiss Miller line. Men with the same surname in the same location, even in the same church, does not equate to the same genetic family line. Any male with a common surname absolutely needs to do Y DNA testing and at the highest level. There’s nothing worse than spending countless hours barking up the wrong tree – especially when Y DNA testing will save you.
  16. Our Speaks man matched another Speak male who knew where his ancestors were from in Lancashire. Testing additional men living in Lancashire at the 111 marker and Big Y levels allowed the Speak line to be divided into specific lineages beginning in the 1500s, piecing together the earlier ancestors into a descendant tree. Recently, an “orphan” line in the US has been connected to his ancestors, thanks to both STR values AND Big Y testing.
  17. Smith is quite interesting because we discover that something doesn’t add up. Our Smith man matches two Smith men who have the same ancestor born in 1810 but that son, John, does not match the descendants of his brothers. There seems to be an undocumented adoption of some sort at that point in time. John Smith’s Y DNA is not the same as his brothers whose descendants match each other. Given that our Smith tester, and his two matches, do not match the other descendants of the ancestor they are supposed to descend from, we can pinpoint the generation in which the adoption event occurred. However, we have a further clue, because these Smith men match the Jennings line closely- including one advanced match where the Smith man also matches autosomally in addition to the Y DNA. This is clearly a case of “you don’t know what you don’t know” and would never have known without Y DNA testing.
  18. Our Bolton tester matches several other Bolton men who descend from a common immigrant ancestor. If the Bolton matches upgrade to the Big Y-700 test, they might be able to determine separate genetic lines branching through the various sons of the immigrant ancestor. Evaluating the surnames that the tester matches at the Big Y level may assist with evaluating deeper ancestry in England and determining where the Bolton ancestors originated before the 1600s in London.
  19. Crumley is a difficult family to research, in part because several people with the same surname are found in close proximity, but Y DNA testing has shown that these men are not related. Big Y testing has disproved that the Crumley progenitor originated in Germany, although a different Crumley family did. The Big Y matches include many Mc… surnames along with Ferguson and Gillespie. The Big Y Block Tree shows the closest matches with ancestors born in Scotland, Ireland, and Northern Ireland – which is very likely where the Crumley progenitor originated too.
  20. Harrell is another difficult surname, spelled numerous ways with several Harrell/Herrell/Harrold/Herrald families moving westward in the 1600s and 1700s from the thirteen original colonies. This Harrell line has not been able to connect to a single progenitor in the colonies, yet, but Y DNA testing and the block tree confirm that this Harrell line originated in the British Isles, very likely England.

What Did These 20 Men Learn?

Every single one of these men benefitted from Y DNA testing, although exactly how depends to some extent on their testing goal. Other men also benefitted by matching.

One man, our Smith, #17, needs to look at the Jennings family prior to 1810. Is there a Jennings man living in close proximity, or do court records exist that might be illuminating?

If one of these 20 men had been an adoptee or otherwise searching for an unknown paternal line, they would have been able to identify a surname connection and perhaps a progenitor ancestor. I encourage everyone to either order a Family Finder autosomal test or transfer a DNA file (for free) from another vendor if they have taken an autosomal test elsewhere. Step-by-step transfer instructions are found here. Be sure that the Y DNA and autosomal tests are on the same kit/account at FamilyTreeDNA so that you can use the advanced matching tool.

With the Big Y-700 test, these men can discern or confirm lines descending from their direct paternal ancestors – sometimes within a generation or two of the tester. This test is so sensitive and granular and has such deep coverage (millions of bases) now that often we find small mutations between fathers and sons or brothers.

While STR markers, 12-111 are genealogically important, they do tend to mutate rapidly and sometimes back-mutate. SNPs, tested in the Big Y-700 test, don’t do that, and the power of STRs and SNPs together have the potential to break down brick walls and correct trees. In fact, it happens every single day.

Resources

If you’d like to watch a video about Y DNA, Y DNA-related genetic terms, and the benefits of Big Y-700 testing, you can watch a great educational video by Janine Cloud here. Be sure to note the part where she talks about why people who have previously taken the Big Y-500 might want to upgrade to the Big Y-700.

Also, check out my Y DNA Resource page, here.

What Don’t You Know?

Y DNA tests, including the Big Y-700 which includes all STR panels, and the autosomal Family Finder test are on sale at FamilyTreeDNA right now for Father’s Day.

There’s no better time to find missing pieces and discover information that you can’t find any other way.

Click here to order Y DNA tests, the Family Finder, or upgrade an existing test.

_____________________________________________________________

Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

DNA Purchases and Free Transfers

Genealogy Products and Services

Books

Genealogy Research