LAWS RELATING TO BEES 
557 
in such cases are binding only on the courts 
that decided them, and then only where 
there is a lack of higher authority. It mat¬ 
ters not how much was involved in a case, 
nor how ably it was presented and argued, 
nor how learned and scholarly was the 
opinion handed down by the trial judge, 
nor what the verdict of the jury was, pro¬ 
vided it was a jury case; unless the ease 
was appealed to a court of last resort the 
decision is not available law. Usually it is 
only the decisions that have been handed 
down in cases that have been appealed to 
a court of last resort that are published, 
and available to the lawyers and the courts 
in general and can be considered as law 
by them. 
GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF LAW PERTAINING- 
TO BEES. 
But the fact that but little litigation 
concerning bees has reached the courts of 
last resort does not mean that the law 
governing bees and their keeping was in an 
undetermined state. Law deals primarily 
with principles; the subject matter is sec¬ 
ondary. To ascertain what the law is in a 
given instance, all that is really necessary 
to do is to apply an established principle 
of law to the facts in the case. For exam¬ 
ple, to steal the property of another person 
is larceny, and it matters not whether the 
subject matter stolen be an automobile, a 
caged lion, an aeroplane, or a hive of bees, 
as it is the act that constitutes the offense. 
The law as laid down by Blackstone and 
other law writers of his time and of times 
prior is briefly as follows: 
That bees are wild by nature; therefore, 
tho they swarm upon your tree they are not 
yours until you have hived them, any more 
than the birds that have their nests in your 
trees or the rabbits that run wild thru your 
fields. But when they have been hived by 
you they are your property • the same as 
any other wild animal that you may have 
reduced to possession. Animals that are 
wild by nature and have been captured by 
you, should they escape, you still have a 
right in them if you follow them with the 
idea of recovery. A swarm of bees that has 
left your hive continues to be yours so long 
as you can keep them in sight and under 
any probability of recovery; 2 Blackstone 
Com. 392; Coopers Justinian Inst. Lib. 2, 
tit. 1, No. 14; Wood’s Civil Law, bk. 2, 
chap. 3, p. 103; Domat’s Civil Law, vol. 1, 
bk. 3, pt. 1, Subd. 7, No. 2133; Puffen- 
dorf's Law of Nature, 4, chap. 6, No. 5; 
Code Napoleon No. 524; Bracton’s Law, 
2, chap. 1, No. 3; and see notes in 40 
L. R. A. 687; 62 L. R. A. 133. 
During the early development of our 
eastern States the general principle of 
law relative to ownership of bees was ad¬ 
judicated in a number of eases. The ques¬ 
tions raised and the decisions rendered are 
briefly as follows: Where bees have es¬ 
caped and so properly may be considered 
as wild bees and without any owner at the 
time of their discovery it has been held 
that such bees in a tree belong to the 
owner of the soil where the tree stands. 
Merrills vs. Goodwin, 1 Root 209; Fergu¬ 
son vs. Miller, 1 Cow. 243; 13 Am. Dee. 
519; Goff vs. Kilts, 15 Wend. 550. 
That bees are ferae naturae, that is, wild 
by nature, but when hived and reclaimed 
may be subject of ownership. State vs. 
Murphy, 8 Blackf. 498; Gillet vs. Mason, 
7 Johns. 16; Rexroth vs. Coon, 15 R. I. 
35; 23 Atl. 37. 
But the finding of a swarm of bees in a 
tree on the land of another, marking the 
tree and notifying the owner of the land 
does not give the finder such property in 
the honey as will entitle him to maintain 
trover for the honey. Fisher vs. Steward, 
Smith 60. 
Where one discovers wild bees in a tree, 
and obtains license from the owner of the 
land to take possession of them, and marks 
the tree with his initials, he gains no prop¬ 
erty in them until he takes them into his 
possession. Gillett vs. Mason, and Fergu¬ 
son vs. Miller, supra. 
Where bees take up their abode in a tree, 
they belong to the owner of the soil even 
tho they are reclaimed; but if they have 
been reclaimed and their owner is able to 
identify them as in a case where he fol¬ 
lowed the bees and saw them enter the tree, 
they do not belong to the owner of the soil, 
but to him who had former possession, 
altho he cannot enter upon the land of the 
owner of the tree and retake them without 
subjecting himself to an action for tres¬ 
pass. Goff vs. Kilts, 15 Wend. 550. 
In a case decided in 1898 and entitled 
State of Iowa vs. Victor Repp, 104 Iowa, 
