Cirsium brevistylum

Clustered thistle

Family: Asteraceae · Type: perennial · Native

Clustered thistle is a California native perennial herb found in northwestern, central western, southern coastal, and northern Channel Islands bioregions in moist places at elevations below 500 meters. Flowering from March to August, this plant produces white to purple flowers in heads 2.5 to 3.5 centimeters wide, with needle-like phyllary tips and a loosely cobwebby appearance. Growing 30 to 350 centimeters tall with a single generally branched stem that is jointed-hairy and sometimes cobwebby, particularly near the flower heads. Its leaves are gray-tomentose underneath, with proximal leaves 15 to 25 centimeters long, shallowly lobed and dentate, featuring spines 3 to 7 millimeters long. The fruit is 3 to 4.5 millimeters long with a pappus 10 to 22 millimeters in length.

Habitat: Moist places

Bloom period: Mar-Aug

Elevation: < 500 m

Bioregions: NW, CW, SCo, n ChI

Data from The California Species Project — 14,000+ California species with verified data from CNPS, CDFW, USFWS, Jepson eFlora, Cal-IPC, and more.