In America today, the best-known dandelion species is Taraxacum officinale. According to Columbia University, it was deliberately introduced several times across the Americas. The Puritans brought it to New England, reporting by 1672 that the plants had become well established but, meanwhile, the Spanish brought dandelions to Mexico and California, and the French introduced them to Canada.

As a plant with so many different species, though, there's an abundance of native dandelions found across North America. An article in Candian Science Publishing talks about the variety of dandelions found in British Columbia alone. The problem is that, because dandelions can be difficult to distinguish from each other, other species are often mistaken for their European cousins. Botanist Curtis R. Björk, the author of a 2019 study in the journal Botany, is vocal about the need for conservation of indigenous dandelion species, particularly to prevent the rarest of them from going extinct. Björk describes the native dandelion species as beautiful and garden-worthy, hinting that perhaps gardeners could do their part in conservation efforts by leaving at least a few dandelions to grow.

Some native dandelions are easier to distinguish purely by where they can be found growing. The horned dandelion (Taraxacum ceratophorum), for example, is North America's most widespread native species, according to the U.S. Forest Service. Rather than lawns, these rugged wildflowers prefer to grow on mountains, above the tree line, and in the chilly low Arctic zone.

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