For those of you who have been waiting for the 3rd phase of our Wells
DNA testing, it may now be time. Ancestry has a special on their
Autosomal DNA testing at $99. That is what they were running when they
introduced the Beta testing. This will only work for you if there is
someone in the data base who has been tested and who is a direct cousin.
It may or may not turn up a Wells relative or someone who knows they
are a Wells descendant and shows as a 1st, 2nd, 3rd etc cousin. It
gets shakier the further back the connection because autosomal DNA
dilutes 50% at each generation.
If you know of a cousin you believe will prove the connection, then you
should be able to prove it if you can also get that person to test.
If you are among those who have an adoption in your family at 1 to 3
generations, this might help you narrow down the relationship IF someone
from your "birth" family gets tested.
Two other testing firms are also doing autosomal DNA testing now and
both have sales on as well.
Family Tree DNA is offering theirs at $169 and 23AndMe is offering their
at $99. They do not share the results nor is there a common database.
So if you have the money you might consider all three because it greatly
expands the exposure with allegedly approaching 500,000 samples between
the three databases.
If you know your Wells connection through a male line, this won't add
anything to it unless it happens to link you to another of your
ancestral families. It won't help much for the more distant ancestry
unless you get REALLY lucky. Not everyone will benefit from this, but
if you need help it can't hurt.
This testing involves so many more markers that there is no way we can
attempt to track the results as we have been able to do with the
y-chromosome testing. We won't even try, but we do want to hear about
any successes.
Doing the y-chromosome testing is still the best way to link into your
ancestral Wells family. We still have a discount through the project if
you are ready to do this. Current cost is $149 - a 20% discount.
Contact me if you are ready to do this.