This is a widespread variable species of marshy grasslands in cool temperate and boreal regions of North American. In southastern stats, it extends south to se. Mo, s. Ill., c. Ind., c. Ohio andf along the higher Appalachians to ne. Ga. (K). The only certain native Ky. record is from wet meadows in BALL (EKY), where it was collected by R. Athey in the 1970s but not seen since. There is also a 1984 coll. from the Silver Grove railroad yard in CAMP, presumably disprsed as a waif along the railroad (Thieret & Thompson 1984). The BALL coll. has been referred to var. macouniana (Vasey) Stebbins, but treatment of intraspecific taxa in canadensis remains challenging; 2n = 28 to 66.