• Question: Why is ginger the least common hair colour?

    Asked by BanannaX to Alex, Ali, Kerry, Philip, Theo on 14 Nov 2014.
    • Photo: Kerry O'Shea

      Kerry O'Shea answered on 14 Nov 2014:

      I’m afraid I don’t know the answer to this one as I’ve never studied biological science or genetics! As far as I know it occurs because of a particular gene being copied but I don’t know why it happens so infrequently. I saw an article that suggested red hair will die out in the near future but there wasn’t much evidence in the report.

    • Photo: Philip Ratcliffe

      Philip Ratcliffe answered on 14 Nov 2014:

      Well I’m no expert on genetics, but first of all I’d say that somebody had to lose the race and it turned out to be red hair. The point is that some genes are dominant and some not. I suppose the red-hair gene just happened to be the one the usually loses the fight.

    • Photo: Alison Thomson

      Alison Thomson answered on 14 Nov 2014:

      As a Scottish girl, I seem to get asked this regularly, even though I’m a brunette! The ginger-gene isn’t a dominant one, which means both of your parents have to at least be carrying the ginger gene for there to be any chance of you being ginger!

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