Carduus

Accepted species 137 Documented here 24 Family Asteraceae

Accepted species 137 in this genus

Every accepted species in the genus is listed. A name links to its page when we hold at least three commercially licensed photographs of it. Where we do not, the row shows how many we actually found, which is usually none.

SpeciesAuthority Usable photographsPage
Carduus nutans L. 3,009 documented
Carduus crispus L. 1,361 documented
Carduus crispus Guirao ex Nyman 1,361 documented
Carduus acanthoides L. 1,153 documented
Carduus pycnocephalus L. 1,001 documented
Carduus defloratus L. 288 documented
Carduus tenuiflorus Curtis 266 documented
Carduus uncinatus M.Bieb. 95 documented
Carduus macrocephalus Coss. ex Willk. & Lange 77 documented
Carduus personata (L.) Jacq. 67 documented
Carduus squarrosus DC. ex Lowe 41 documented
Carduus spachianus Durieu 40 documented
Carduus nigrescens Vill. 35 documented
Carduus carlinoides Gouan 19 documented
Carduus hamulosus Ehrh. 14 documented
Carduus maroccanus (Arènes) Kazmi 12 documented
Carduus carpetanus Boiss. & Reut. 11 documented
Carduus chrysacanthus Ten. 8 documented
Carduus collinus Waldst. & Kit. 8 documented
Carduus argyroa Biv. 7 documented
Carduus argentatus L. 6 documented
Carduus clavulatus Link 5 documented
Carduus numidicus Coss. & Durieu 4 documented
Carduus litigiosus Nocca & Balb. 3 documented
Carduus adpressus C.A.Mey. 2 below the evidence gate
Carduus asturicus Franco 2 below the evidence gate
Carduus myriacanthus Salzm. ex DC. 2 below the evidence gate
Carduus cephalanthus Viv. 1 below the evidence gate
Carduus corymbosus Ten. 1 below the evidence gate
Carduus meonanthus Hoffmanns. & Link 1 below the evidence gate
Carduus × aragonensis Devesa & Talavera 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus × camplonensis Devesa & Talavera 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus × cantabricus Devesa & Talavera 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus × conjugens R.E.Fr. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus × cyrneus Schlüssel & Jeanm. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus × ipe Boros 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus × orthocephalus Wallr. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus × septentrionalis Devesa & Talavera 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus × vigoi Mateo 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus abruzzensis Arènes 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus acanthocephalus C.A.Mey. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus acicularis Bertol. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus affinis Guss. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus afromontanus R.E.Fr. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus albescens Rouy 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus amanus Rech.f. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus aurosicus Vill. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus baeocephalus Webb 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus bourgaeanus Boiss. & Reut. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus bourgaei Kazmi 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus broteroi Welw. ex Cout. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus brunneri Döll 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus budaianus Javorka. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus calabricus Arènes 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus candicans Waldst. & Kit. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus canduelis Gren. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus carduelis (L.) Gren. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus chevallieri Barratte ex Chevall. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus conjungens R.E.Fr. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus conrathii Hayek 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus dahuricus (Arènes) Kazmi 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus dubius Balb. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus edelbergii Rech.f. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus estivali Arènes 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus euboicus Franco 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus fallax Borbás 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus fasciculiflorus Viv. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus getulus Pomel 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus gillotii Rouy 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus grassensis Briq. & Cavill. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus grenieri Sch.Bip. ex Nyman 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus halanensis Degen & Lengyel 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus heteromorphus Sennholz 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus hohenackeri Kazmi 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus ibicensis (Devesa & Talavera) Rosselló & N.Torres 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus intercedens Hausskn. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus jordanii Arènes 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus juratzkae Beck 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus keniensis R.E.Fr. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus kerneri Simonk. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus kirghisicus Sultanova 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus kumaunensis (Arènes) Kazmi 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus lanuginosus Willd. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus leptacanthus Fresen. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus leptocephalus Peterm. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus leptocladus Durieu 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus leridanus Devesa & Talavera 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus lesurinus Rouy 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus littoralis Borbás 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus lobulatus Borbás 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus loretii Rouy 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus lusitanicus Rouy 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus macracanthus Kazmi 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus majellensis Huter, Porta & Rigo 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus malyi Greuter 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus maritimum Elmer 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus martinezii Pau 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus meratii Arènes 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus merxmuelleri Kazmi 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus millefolius R.E.Fr. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus mixtus Corb. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus modestii Tamamsch. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus moritzii Brügger 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus naegelii Brügger 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus nawaschini Bordz. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus nervosus K.Koch 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus nyaradyanus Degen ex Nyarady 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus nyassanus R.E.Fr. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus occidentalis Nutt. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus olympicus Boiss. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus onopordioides Fisch. ex M.Bieb. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus onopordoides Fisch. ex M.Bieb. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus onopyxos Hill 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus pancicii Sch.Bip. ex Nyman 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus peisonis Teyber 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus poliochrus Trautv. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus pseudohamulosus Beck 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus puechii Coste 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus ramosissimus Pančić 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus rechingerianus Kazmi 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus rivasgodayanus Devesa & Talavera 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus ruwenzoriensis S.Moore 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus sardous DC. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus schimperi Sch.Bip. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus schulzeanus Ruhmer 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus seminudus M.Bieb. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus semiperegrinus Aellen 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus sepincolus Hausskn. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus silvarum R.E.Fr. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus solteszii Budai 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus thracicus (Velen.) Hayek 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus tmoleus Boiss. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus transcaspicus Gand. 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus turocensis Margittai 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus vaillantii Arènes 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus verlotii Arènes 0 below the evidence gate
Carduus weizensis Hayek 0 below the evidence gate

Why some species have no pagethe gate

This site is commercial, so it can only publish photographs licensed for commercial use. Roughly three quarters of the photographs on iNaturalist are CC BY-NC, which excludes them. A species needs at least three usable photographs before we will build it a page, because a page with one picture and no traits tells you nothing you could not get from a search result, and generating hundreds of thousands of those is precisely the practice that got the previous version of this site deleted.

So the species above without a link are not errors and they are not omissions. They are real, accepted plants that we cannot yet document to the standard we hold ourselves to, and the count in the photographs column is exactly how far short we fall.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. Accepted names, authorities, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. Photograph counts, restricted to CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA. Retrieved 2026-06-27.