How many avenues do you explore?

[Phoenix]

I started off by simply looking at the families in a hamlet whom I knew to be related, then tracing their descendants. This was prompted by a whole ghetto of them living in Portsmouth: clearly the kinship and friendship ties kept them together.

But now I find I am diving down every rabbit hole, chasing spouses, and their parents, and their parents. Emma Mary Watton was a small (but fascinating!) twiglet, but this evening I've been looking at the will of her stepfather's uncle.

Is it rational? Is this sane?

[Shona]

It's fun and exciting - isn't that enough? Emma isn't even a cell in a twiglet in my gnarled tree, but it was enjoyable looking for her. It's the search and sense of excitement at a discovery that is so addictive.

[ElizabethHerts]

Phoenix, I'm so nosy/inquisitive that I too seize upon anything interesting and go up and down the generations, often of people who are twiglets upon my tree. As Shona says, the search and detective work are a huge part of the enjoyment, and the result is the icing on the cake.

[Lindsay]

Not forgetting that sometimes these sideshoots lead back to your main tree in a way you never expected!

[Phoenix]

That is my theory, Lindsay. I know how my ancestors would probably have travelled from Poole to Portsmouth because I made contact with the descendant of their neighbours who had migrated at about the same time. His ancestor lived to be 100 and was full of stories. And I was subsequently able to pass that information on to an australian branch of the family who had been searching independently.

Originally Posted by Lindsay

Not forgetting that sometimes these sideshoots lead back to your main tree in a way you never expected!

Oh yes. I am always being distracted by offshoots and then think errr hold on what am I doing but sometimes I have followed the trail and it leads right back to where I wanted to be with the information that I needed.

[Asa]

Every avenue that interests me and all sorts of things grab my interest - and I'm so glad I record things that don't always seem to be closely related - having a wonderful week of genealogy after the Oxfordshire wills appeared on Origins. Several things I noted from PRs about twenty years ago have been such a help because several loosely connected families have turned out to be be closely related on other sides.

[marquette]

I have chased up and down many branches - partly because some of OH's branches and some of mine came from the same small areas of a county and I wanted to find out if there was any other inter-marriages over the years (aside from ours, of course).

I have never found another direct marriage of the two families in Berkshire, but both appear to have married into the same families at one time or another.

I will chase down every descendent or ancestor, because I love the hunt and sometimes there are very interesting stories to be found. I do sometimes wonder, how far should I go, but I keep going until I can find no more.

[Olde Crone]

I go so far sideways I often meet myself coming round the corner. As you have all remarked, not wasted effort at all because it often throws up connections you wouldn't ever have found by "normal" research paths.

OC

A cousin did research on our Slomans in Somerset on a trip to UK 20+ years ago .. and he didn't know if the families were connected .. Now he finds from online research and online contacts that the familes are connected and he is very chuffed ..