Vargas C., H., Bobadilla G., D., Gallo D., P., Sepulveda, G., & Mendoza, M.R. 1999 [Observations about the distribution, abundance and economic importance of the ensign coccids, Orthezia spp. (Homoptera: Ortheziidae) in Northernmost Chile.]. Idesia (16): 125-135.

Notes: Results of a three-year study about the distribution and host-plants of the ensign coccids (Coccoidea: Ortheziidae) in northernmost Chile are presented here. The survey was accomplished in the valleys of the Province of Arica as well as in the cultivated area of andean counterforts of the Province of Parinacota, and it has made evident the presence of three allopatric ensign coccid species belonging to genus Orthezia, whose populations have a clearly differentiated and delimited geographic distribution. Those are local populations or demes which spread slowly through a clumped spatial pattern of distribution, thus normally damaging host-plants only by patches of vegetation. One out of three detected coccoid species has indeed pest status, i.e. Orthezia olivicola Beingolea, a euryphagous that can breed on wild and cultivated plants, though only being a serious pest of olive trees in the valley of Azapa, where its geographic distribution in Chile is restricted. The remaining two species are provisionally determined at genus level (i.e. Orthezia spp.) but being very different from O. olivicola. Orthezia sp.2 breeds on Origanum vulgare L. (Labiatae) and ranges along the cultivated counterforts, from 2.000 up to 3.500 m. above sea level in both of the basins of San Jose (Azapa) river and Lluta river. However, this "pot marjoram ensign coccid" does not reach pest status, mainly because of high rates of parasitism and predatism which frequently occur there, and thus maintaining coccoid populations at levels below those causing economic damage. The last species, Orthezia sp.3, is oligophagous and breeds only on wild woody plants of Asteraceae, along the coastal valley of Lluta river. Unlike the two above-mentioned species, which reproduce parthenogenetically, this coccoid has a normal bisexual reproduction.