41 
A NOVEL WAY TO OBTAIN BEES CHEAP. 
In sections of our country where hollow trees and 
large timber is scarce, the following will be found to 
work admirably ; first get in readiness any kind of an 
old hive, clean it out, nail on a bottom board, giving a 
medium entrance for the bees Take it some pleasant 
evening or just at night into the woods, and by the use 
of a ladder and bit of rope tie it fast near the top of 
some tree, in an obscure place as possible and await the 
swarming of your neighboring Apiaries. It you have sev- 
eral of those decoy hives established in the vicinity of 
tame bees you may calculate upon a large portion of the 
swarms that fly to the bush. The hives should be plac- 
ed in the forest as soon as the trees leave out in the 
spring, and the party doing it would do well to keep the 
business to himself, and during the swarming season it 
would be advisable to look after them every two or three 
days ; that as soon as auy of them are occupied to re- 
move them to the house for more safe keeping : by stop- 
ping up the entrance, they ean be taken down and carri- 
ed to the house with safety. I know a man a year or 
two ago in Lowell, Mass., who put out a large number 
of those decoy hives, and over half of them were filled 
with bees. 
It is an old adage that there arc tricks in all trades 
but ours, (the bee business not excepted.) Therefore I 
trust the reader will excuse me for any impropriety . I 
may have committed. 
WHY BEES DO NOT SW ARM REGULARI/Y 
EACH YEAR, 
Nature through the expression of her varied forms, as 
the index hand that sweeps over the concentric circles 
