And A. nemoralis Ait. I arrived at the University of New Hampshire to start my Ph.D. studies just as Rad had completed his work. My major professor was Dr. Owen M. Rogers in the Plant Science Department. Owen was the best major professor because he gave me the freedom to become involved in my own project. Owen had all of the known genetic material for Syringa on the U.N.H. farm and one of the traditions of his students was helping him with his pollination's every June.
Hybrid habitats are often disturbed habitats where hybrid forms can thrive through colonization.
In the case of these particular Asters, the 'swarm' would be formed by the merging of the shady forest habitat of A. acuminatus with the more open, sunny shoreline habitat of A. nemoralis . These shorelines could be fresh- or saltwater. Glaciation caused these kinds of mergings in the past. Thus when the two species became physically close, they hybridized. The hybrid swarm is thus the two species in sympatry with hybrids intermingled with them, particularly where there is habitat disturbance.