DNA The Next Step

[chiddicks]

So in my last blog we established that I am about as “British” as you can get at 86% British!

So what do I do next to interpret my results?

Ancestry has come up with literally hundreds of matches, too many to comprehend and deal with, so how do I approach this in a co-ordinated fashion?

I have set myself up a spreadsheet to both filter how I prioritise my matches and also as a means of recording the responses. Number 1 priority has to be Cm number, basically that means the higher the Cm score, the closer the match to me. Another filter mechanism is when a person last logged in, its an indication of the likelihood of a response.

I have also considered those with "no trees" equally as important as those that have trees already online with ancestry. There could be many reasons why an individual has no online tree currently. I have drafted two distinct generic messages to those that I contact, a "no tree" message and a "with tree" message. The messages differ slightly but are hopefully friendly warm and engaging. These will be sent out on a batch basis so that I don't overload myself and can manage the replies.

So I now have a plan of attack of how to deal with the hundreds of matches from Ancestry.

 

 


Week 1 has proved really interesting, my highest Cm match so far is 91, with a large percentage in the 40-60 range. In theory these should provide the best and most obvious matches between our trees.

What has been really interesting, is the amount of USA shared DNA that I have uncovered, especially given my ethnicity estimate didn’t show any! I accept that a large percentage of those that have tested with Ancestry hail from the USA, but at the moment I have no known ancestors connected to the USA, so this is a really new and exciting challenge.

I have had a really good response so far with lots of replies, which I now need to cross match with my tree to see if I can find a common ancestor, some are obvious, but plenty are not!!

What I have I also had is a few people from adopted families who are trying to trace their respective families, again I have shared DNA which is really interesting. Although I have shared DNA its almost impossible to offer much help. I did raise a question on #ancestryhour and thanks to the help from my friends there, I  was able to pass on some helpful hints to those tracing adopted families.

So overall progress has been good, I have a plan in place which I will keep ticking along in the back ground, before I move onto the next stage, which will be downloading my raw data and uploading to various other sites DNA sites…………………….so watch this space.

Special thanks #AncestryHour and in particular @genealogylass for all her help, guidance and just as important patience…………….