diff --git a/public/java/src/org/broadinstitute/sting/gatk/walkers/annotator/DepthPerAlleleBySample.java b/public/java/src/org/broadinstitute/sting/gatk/walkers/annotator/DepthPerAlleleBySample.java
index 6b6648a98..4f4608a36 100755
--- a/public/java/src/org/broadinstitute/sting/gatk/walkers/annotator/DepthPerAlleleBySample.java
+++ b/public/java/src/org/broadinstitute/sting/gatk/walkers/annotator/DepthPerAlleleBySample.java
@@ -151,7 +151,7 @@ public class DepthPerAlleleBySample extends GenotypeAnnotation implements Standa
         return Arrays.asList(
                 new VCFFormatHeaderLine(
                         getKeyNames().get(0),
-                        VCFHeaderLineCount.A,
+                        VCFHeaderLineCount.UNBOUNDED,
                         VCFHeaderLineType.Integer,
                         "Allelic depths for the ref and alt alleles in the order listed"));
     }
diff --git a/public/java/src/org/broadinstitute/sting/utils/variantcontext/writer/BCF2Writer.java b/public/java/src/org/broadinstitute/sting/utils/variantcontext/writer/BCF2Writer.java
index 7e0a2f524..adc6c5bad 100644
--- a/public/java/src/org/broadinstitute/sting/utils/variantcontext/writer/BCF2Writer.java
+++ b/public/java/src/org/broadinstitute/sting/utils/variantcontext/writer/BCF2Writer.java
@@ -221,7 +221,7 @@ class BCF2Writer extends IndexingVariantContextWriter {
 
     private final int getNGenotypeFieldValues(final String field, final VariantContext vc) {
         final VCFCompoundHeaderLine metaData = VariantContext.getMetaDataForField(header, field);
-        int nFields = metaData.getCount(vc.getNAlleles());
+        int nFields = metaData.getCount(vc.getNAlleles() - 1);
         if ( nFields == -1 ) { // unbounded, need to look at values
             return computeMaxSizeOfGenotypeFieldFromValues(field, vc);
         } else {