Why Conservation Matters
When I was in college, I had the opportunity to work in Samoa with the Dept. of Marine and Wildlife Resources. One of my responsibilities was helping search for a bat species that hadn’t been seen in years. Scientists were worried it might already be extinct.
Each night we would head into the darkness, put on headphones, and use special 'bat detectors' designed to pick up their ultrasonic calls. If the species was still out there, we hoped to hear it.
Night after night we listened, hoping to hear even a single call.
All we ever heard was silence.
That silence stayed with me. It was a powerful reminder that species can disappear quietly—and often without most people even realizing it.
Over the years I’ve been fortunate to continuing working alongside my wife and now two young girls in many other ways to help support wildlife: helping release baby sea turtles, tagging migrating monarch butterflies, and even preparing food for giant pandas. These experiences reinforced the same lesson again and again—our natural world is incredibly beautiful, but it is also fragile...and we are called to be good stewards of it.
My wife and I's passion for conservation and desire to teach our young girls to be good caretakers of the world they live in, helped inspire our vision behind The Little Caterpillar.
People who love butterflies and insects should be able to preserve and appreciate their beauty without worrying that their purchase contributes to harming them. That’s why we focus on ethical, sustainable, and transparent sourcing for all the specimens we offer.
Our Goal Is to Be the Most Sustainable and Ethical Insect Supplier in the World
This is not a slogan or a marketing claim — it is a responsibility we take seriously.
The insect trade touches fragile ecosystems, wildlife, and communities around the world. Our goal is to prove that it can be done ethically, sustainably, transparently, and with measurable positive impact.
How We Will Reach This Goal
1. Giving Back to Conservation
We believe stewardship means generosity.
Each month, our company gives back 1% of sales towards conservation. These funds are directed toward organizations and initiatives that are actively working to protect ecosystems, wildlife, and biodiversity
Our Conservation Partners we Support:
2. Ethical and Sustainable Sourcing — With Accountability
Ethical sourcing is the foundation of everything we do.
We are a licensed importer, and every single insect we sell has been legally exported from its country or origin and imported into the USA. Each shipment has been inspected by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, and meets strict legal and conservation standards.
Our goal is for you to have confidence you are buying fully legal, sustainable insects that follow all international conservation laws. Our company wants to be built upon honesty and integrity no matter the cost or competition we face.
We work exclusively with ethical, sustainable farms and suppliers around the world. We have even gone further than paperwork- and are one of the only companies to personally visit farms and suppliers to verify that their promises match their practices. We avoid sources that harm ecosystems, over‑collect, or exploit wildlife.
3. Active Participation in Conservation
Conservation will continue to be the the heart of what we do. It is not something we only want support financially — it is something we want to actively continue to participate in.
In the last 6 years, Little Caterpillar has volunteered with the annual monarch migration in cooperation with Monarch Watch, tagging monarchs and contributing data to help scientist understand migration patterns and population health.
Tagging and Recording Monarchs in NE
We have also participated in butterfly monitoring with the National Park Service, volunteered internationally with a giant panda breeding program, and helped release green sea turtle hatch-lings into the ocean.
Professionally, our staff also has backgrounds with The American Samoa Department of Marine and Wildlife, Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, and Rainwater Basin Joint Venture.
4. Community and Indigenous Partnerships
We want to go beyond butterflies and also care for people.
Many of the butterfly farms and partners we work with operate in regions where employment opportunities are limited. These farms provide local families with:
* Stable jobs
* Fair income
*Skills and long‑term livelihoods
During the COVID pandemic, some of these farms were among the only sources of employment available in their communities.
Our heart is overseas, but we also want to give back LOCALLY. Currently we have volunteered and participated through non-profit educational programs, libraries, and our local church.
Finding a BIG God in the small things during VBS
Our Commitment Going Forward
This is just the beginning. We recognize that sustainability and ethics are ongoing commitments and we will continue to push ourselves to give our time and finances to something bigger than us.
We are committed to:
* Continuous improvement
* Transparency
* Accountability
* Listening, learning, and adapting as science and best practices evolve
Our goal is simple, but ambitious:
To prove that the insect trade can protect ecosystems, support communities, and operate with integrity — at every level... and let the smallest of things make the biggest of impacts.