This urban butterfly farm in the heart of Shelby Park raises and rescues insects

In the lab at this urban bug oasis, exotic cockroaches hiss and tarantulas feed.

Out back in the fly house, butterflies soar.

Stepping into Shelby Park’s Idlewild Butterfly Farm and Insectarium at 1100 Logan St. feels like walking into a laboratory, a bug zoo and a breathtaking garden all at once. For the past eight years, this haven and education hub for insects has shipped out as many as 3,000 butterflies a week to exhibits, while simultaneously looking after illegal insects that have been confiscated by the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife.

"It’s cool if you love bugs," Valerie Merrifield, Idlewild’s educator and gardener told me.

"It’s cool, even if I’m afraid of them," I said, keeping a hearty distance between myself and the cage of more than 40 Peruphasma schultei, from Peru.

Merrifield assured me these insects, more commonly known as "black beauties," weren’t going to jump out or hurt me. When they feel threatened, these leggy critters flash small scarlet wings, to warn off predators.

It worked.

I cringed and took another small step back from the cage.

But over the next hour or so as I visited with Merrifield and Idlewild’s owner, Blair Leano-Helvey, I got a crash course in just how important all things creepy and crawly are to our overall existence.

"Insects don't have to be scary," Merrifield told me.

I stared back at those black beauties, unsure.

"We don't have to love them, but we need to respect that they're here," Merrifield said.

How Idlewild's butterfly program was started

I suppose I should clarify the exotic bugs aren't the first thing you see when you step off Logan Street and into Idlewild.

In my case, they were just the most memorable.

These spectacular creatures are tucked in the back of the lab out of sight, and they’re reserved for groups that come in for tours. You can visit with the butterflies fluttering through the fly house in the backyard garden without ever meeting the tarantulas and cockroaches. Caring for exotic bugs is just a fraction of Idlewild's mission.

The butterfly farm supplies butterflies and moths for the Louisville Zoo as well as a collection of university extension programs, exhibits, events and organizations throughout the country.

That’s not how this bug oasis started, though.

Leano-Helvey first began her business in her home in 2009. The idea was simple. She would farm a natural alternative to pesticides, which can harm the environment. Essentially "use bugs, not drugs" to keep local lawns thriving.

She went on to organize the Douglass Loop Farmers Market in 2011, and she brought hundreds of bugs for sale and sold out every week. Eventually, her house became so inundated with her home business that her husband could hear crickets singing and scorpions eating in the middle of the night.

“This isn’t a normal life,” she remembers him telling her.

So she rented Idlewild’s home at 1100 Logan St. in 2015, and over time, she’s shifted the operation to raising butterflies for exhibits. Today that aspect of her business has grown so much that she's had to set up hatching cages in Idlewild's gift shop to meet that demand.

Now most of the USDA-licensed insectarium’s manpower is dedicated to breeding and shipping butterflies, which is incredibly labor-intensive. Her team of seven breeds, raises and then individually packs the brightly colored creatures in envelopes the size of playing cards, so they can ship the butterflies as far away as Seattle.

But the beauty of it all goes well beyond the striking colors on their wings.

“What these butterfly exhibits do, it's not just entertainment,” Leano-Helvey told me. “It is also an opportunity to educate… they talk about the importance of our butterflies, and how they act as pollinators and they're also a food source for many other animals.”

Why education is a large part of Idlewild’s mission

It’s not uncommon for children, who live within city limits, to have almost no experience with bugs. That’s why education is such a large part of Idlewild’s mission.

So when Merrifield speaks at schools or with garden groups or Girl Scouts, she calls the bugs she brings with her “my friends.”

Some of them travel with her to different events, and while she certainly didn’t name all 40 black beauties that I saw in that first cage, a few of the exotic bugs have endearing names.

"Bubbles" is a dead leaf mantis from Malaysia.

"If she’s really nervous she’ll fall to the ground and tuck in her arms and legs, and pretend like she’s a dead leaf," Merrifield told me.

"Buddy" is a tailless whip scorpion, which is native to Arizona and Northern Mexico.

“He’s harmless but he moves really, really fast and that can freak people out,” she said, as she showed me the thin, 4-inch-long whips that uses to feel the environment around him. This bug was Leano-Helvey’s favorite, so much so, she even lets it crawl on top of her head.

“Do they know you?” I asked, wondering if these bugs had adopted the Idlewild team the same way a dog or a cat might have.

It’s more about being familiar with the situation than with a specific person.

"I think they get used to being handled because I have been helping care for these since they were (young)," Merriwether said. "So hands aren’t so scary."

And really, the more I watched her handle them, the less scared I was of them, too.

'Our survival depends on insects'

Eventually, Leano-Helvey would like to get to the point where she can operate a larger bug zoo that’s not in a shared space with her lab.

"Insects are the building blocks of our ecosystems," Leano-Helvey said. "They serve an important purpose, whether it's a food source for other animals or as pollinators."

Overall, she leans away from what she calls the negativity and “doomism” of climate change, but that doesn’t mean that cold flashes in the spring don’t hurt our bugs.

When harsh temperatures shock the insect population the foundation of that ecosystem can crumble.

Leano-Helvey asked me if I’d seen people on social media talking about how squash plants aren’t producing fruit.

I cringed and in a very different way than when I saw those red wings from the black beauty.

"I’ve seen it in my own backyard," I told them. My zucchini plant is three feet tall and three feet wide with stunning blossoms, but I’ve only harvested two zucchini this year.

That’s because there are fewer bees to carry the pollen from the male flowers to the female flowers, Merrifield explained.

It’s not a problem with the plant, it’s a problem with the bugs.

And that creates a problem for everyone.

“If we didn't have our pollinators, we wouldn't have crops,” Leano-Helvey said. “And as annoying as they can be, our survival depends on insects.”

Features columnist Maggie Menderski writes about what makes Louisville, Southern Indiana and Kentucky unique, wonderful, and occasionally, a little weird. If you've got something in your family, your town or even your closet that fits that description — she wants to hear from you. Say hello at mmenderski@courier-journal.com or 502-582-4053. Follow along on Instagram and Twitter @MaggieMenderski. 

Want to go?

WHAT: Idlewild Butterfly Farm and Insectarium

WHERE: 1100 Logan St.

WHEN: Idlewild is open to the public on a limited basis. Summer hours are Fridays 12 p.m. -4 p.m.and Saturdays 10 a.m.-4 p.m.

TOURS: Schedule tours online at idlewildbutterflyfarm.com.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Idlewild Butterfly Farm and Insectarium offers exotic bugs tours