A showy Eurasian native, now locally an established weed, perhaps once escaped from cultivation. Dry, disturbed, usually sandy or gravelly places: roadsides, railroads, fields, vacant lots. First collected in Michigan in 1897 in Kent Co. and soon afterwards found in St. Clair Co. Now common in the Lower Peninsula, though still quite local in the Upper Peninsula.

The bristly hairs on stem, calyx, and usually leaves make some people believe this plant is a kind of thistle. White-flowered forms have been collected in Michigan. The long style is distinctly bifid (0.5–1.5 mm at apex), the corolla is ± pubescent, and the pedicels are all subtended by bracts.