52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Week 29 Prompt - Challenging

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks

Week 29

Prompt – Challenging

DNA !

I have blogged about my trepidation in taking the Ancestry DNA test, but I did it anyway. I have blogged about DNA and it's steep learning curve and how it all fits into my family tree. I believe I will have to put in much more work and study to make it as useful a tool as it claims to be. Ancestry has many tutorials on line. One of these days I will get to them. It might even make DNA less challenging. 

The DNA home page is divided into 3 main panels.

 

My DNA ethnicity estimations is shown as above and it is found in the first panel of my DNA home page. It has a lovely map showing the areas where my ethnicity is found. If you follow through the different groups such as Germans from Russia it gives you a time line of their migration from Germany to United States. It will give you the history of the time which gives you the back story and perhaps the reasons why they moved.

The next panel is the list of my DNA matches which breaks down into the following categories. I have 25.000 + matches. Oh joy. 

Thrulines (Trade Mark of Ancestry) is my favorite part.

 

In this example of my 4^th great grandparents, it shows 2 potential ancestors based on my DNA and similar family trees that I do not have in my Ancestry Family Tree. Franz and Susanna Klassen are already in my tree, but they are there for me to go over and check out sources that other DNA matches have made in their family trees. I want to look at Abraham Krahn. Thrulines suggests that I may be related to 30 DNA matches through this person. 

Now all I have to do is follow up on the 4 trees linked by DNA matches and peruse the 103 other Ancestry Member trees to see if this could possibly be my fourth great grandfather.  One would think that since this ancestor is linked to me through DNA it must be my 4th Great Grandfather.  However Ancestry warns me to check carefully as it is not always a given. Say whaaat?
DNA is challenging for me because it is relatively new for genealogy purposes. It is always evolving. All I need to do is work through it with the help from books and tutorials and get he basics down and the rest will surely follow.

Wendy