---> My response: I just saw the below quote on another forum. So, his own son was a GD of 2 at 12 markers with himself, which really isn't considered a match at all. Meanwhile, is a GD of 2 at 67 which is right on target. A GD of 2 at 25 isn't very conclusive either for R1b1b2 folks. 37 is probably more than sufficient for verifying someone you know is a close genealogical relation, but for searching for people in general, be they the same surname or not, or looking for deeper ancestral clusters or origins, 67 markers is needed. ---> The R-L21 Plus Project Admin posted this on 6 July: My own youngest son and I are a 65/67 match. And what was really mind-bending was that the 2 mutations came in the first 12 markers! Rich ---> fenega@connpoint wrote on 12 June: a point I failed to make earlier. I alluded to this but it didn't translate, so I'll state it more clearly. 23 men match my husband in the 12 marker test, so if we only tested 12 markers, then we'd assume we only had 23 matches. another 4 show up in the 25 marker test, 2 of whom do not show up in the 12 marker test. if we'd only tested 12 markers we'd have no idea these two men were related to us. another 11 show up in the 37 marker test, 5 of which do not show up in 12 or 25 marker testing. so you cannot say that it does no good to test further, some people only show up with further testing. I didn't mention the 67 marker man because he also shows up in the 37 marker test, but if someone were to show up in the 67 marker test with no mention of them in previous tests, that would make my point even further. but at this time my husband has what appears to be (from the larger number of mutations on his dna) a much older, longer seperated, perhaps, lineage than the rest of the lines in group 2 at Moore-worldwide ydna test results. he does belong, but his connection is older than the rest, and he has no relatives who tested. there is a family story of single son descent-large families with lots of girls but only one surviving son. so it may be a long time before we find male Moore relatives, and it may be that there aren't any. this case is one example, and certainly other dna test results will show something of the same pattern. it is the people with higher marker matches that are closer matches. no, less markers is not sufficient. this is especially so for the R1b lot, but is important for every haplogroup. to put it simply, you catch more with a bigger net. Cornelia