During the grasshopper egg surveys conducted in Saskatchewan by the Dominion Entomological Laboratory at Saskatoon since 1932, bee fly larvae were commonly found destroying grasshopper egg pods. In the early years of these annual surveys little was known regarding the species, life-history or economic importance of these larvae. This prompted a study of the bionomics of the species, subsequently determined as Systoechus vulgaris Loew, and a morphological study of its immature stages.

Five species of Coleophora feeding on seeds of Aster and Solidago in Ohio and Kentucky are here distinguished. All may be easily differentiated by definite characters of the male genitalia, and less easily by the female genitalia; differentiating characters of wing and antennal markings, although present, do not afford sure separation. The wings are brownish or grayish ocherous, with longitudinal white lines following veins, fold and dorsal margin, often confluent in the costal area, and more or less dusted with fuscous scales. Antennae may or may not be annulate, but the character is constant for the species.

Length 14 to 16 mm., the size large as in formosa manitoba Leng. Halotype, allotype, and eight paratypes the humeral lunule, middle band, and apical lunule completely confluent, the dark part of each elytron reduced to a triangular area extending to the apical third on the suture as figured; four paratypes similar but with feeble dark suffusions at the junction of each middle band with the humeral and apical lunules; one paratype with the middle band well separated from the lunules, the pattern in this specimen as in an average specimen of manitoba.