Why is light blonde hair so rare?

[Oliver109]

This may sound like a question that has probably been asked on here before but it is curious that while blonde hair is fairly common across much of northern and eastern Europe genuinely light shades are quite rare outside certain areas like parts of Sweden, northern Netherlands, Denmark and Norway. This is the type of hair i am referring to:

[Rostos vilmoskörte]

Because it's mostly only found in young children or adults with light hair and sun bleached hair.
Light haired people get darker hair with age which makes it rare.

[Grace O'Malley]

Because of genetics. It's the same with red hair. Recessive genes and not enough people carrying the genes. White blond hair would be very recessive and you would need both sets of parents to be carriers. It is likely multiple genes also and not just a matter of one blond gene from each parent but multiple genes affecting the trait. Eye colour is the same in that it is a multiple gene trait.

[Oliver109]

Because of genetics. It's the same with red hair. Recessive genes and not enough people carrying the genes. White blond hair would be very recessive and you would need both sets of parents to be carriers. It is likely multiple genes also and not just a matter of one blond gene from each parent but multiple genes affecting the trait. Eye colour is the same in that it is a multiple gene trait.

With white blonde hair i think most people in blonde regions would carry the genes? no? like if you are from eastern England or Scotland say you will certainly have blonde genes in pretty much every family, heck in Ireland too but these countries have maybe 1% of people with very light blonde hair and even in Sweden the figure is probably not more that 5-10%.

[Grace O'Malley]

With white blonde hair i think most people in blonde regions would carry the genes? no? like if you are from eastern England or Scotland say you will certainly have blonde genes in pretty much every family, heck in Ireland too but these countries have maybe 1% of people with very light blonde hair and even in Sweden the figure is probably not more that 5-10%.

Yes it's multiple traits. I carry a red hair variant, a blond variant and dark haired genes. It is why you get people with reddish brown hair or strawberry blond etc. So with the light blond they will carry all light blond traits and not genes for other hair colours.

[Oliver109]

Yes it's multiple traits. I carry a red hair variant, a blond variant and dark haired genes. It is why you get people with reddish brown hair or strawberry blond etc. So with the light blond they will carry all light blond traits and not genes for other hair colours.

I think pretty much all Europeans carry genes for red and blonde hair, in Spain most carry those variants too but of course bright red hair for example is about 100 times less common than in Britain, same for bright blonde hair.

[Hektor12]

Recessive genes. During every new DNA encoding, DNA shall find errors (mutations) and fix them. New mutations in genetical code are weak (recessive) and older, stabile code easily dominates over them. (dominant)

[renaissance12]

This may sound like a question that has probably been asked on here before but it is curious that while blonde hair is fairly common across much of northern and eastern Europe genuinely light shades are quite rare outside certain areas like parts of Sweden, northern Netherlands, Denmark and Norway. This is the type of hair i am referring to:

She looks a replicant ( and so not a really human being .. like some negro from s.s africa or very chinese looking person ) in a new Blade Runner movie...

[Grace O'Malley]

I think pretty much all Europeans carry genes for red and blonde hair, in Spain most carry those variants too but of course bright red hair for example is about 100 times less common than in Britain, same for bright blonde hair.

No they don't. Lots of people don't carry red or blond gene variants.

[Oliver109]

No they don't. Lots of people don't carry red or blond gene variants.

How is that? surely in a population where there exist large enough numbers of people with those hair colours people will carry the variant? i admit i am not well versed in this really but i do find it a bit confusing.