Collected only once, along a roadside in Cheboygan Co. in 1926. Native to the North American prairie and introduced in our area.

This species and C. undulatum have often been confused, but differ in chromosome number as well as other characters besides those in the key. Cirsium flodmanii tends to be a more delicate plant, with deeper-lobed, more pinnatifid leaves, while in the robust C. undulatum the leaves are sometimes only shallowly lobed. Cirsium flodmanii has deeper purple heads.