In commencing to keep bees, if possible start with good, strong, healthy stocks, in the right kind of a hive; then you will have no difficulty in changing them. But if this cannot possibly be done, be sure to start with strong, healthy stocks. If you must take second-class hives, of this class the plain movable comb and box hives are best. But be sure to let the patent hives entirely alone; they are a curse to the bee-keeper. If you get your bees in second-class hives, transfer them to Controllable Hives, or as fast as they swarm put them in Controllable Hives. In this way you will soon have your bees in shape to pay you a good profit. When you begin keeping bees, study closely their natural habits and requirements. Give them such care and attention as your judgement and present knowledge teaches they require. Persevere, and ultimate success is certain. Every one who attains success with bees, will find that there is something more to be done, than simply to stand with folded hands, with the expectation that a fortune must inevitably follow. Know the precise condition of your bees at all times--whether they are weak or strong, whether they are without a queen, or whether the queen has become so old as to have passed her usefulness. After a period of years, queens become barren, and unless they are removed, and a young queen substituted, the bees will rapidly decline in numbers, and all disappear from the hive in a few weeks or months. It cannot be too strongly urged upon the beginner, this great necessity of securing strong, healthy stocks to begin with; and if possible, get them in the Controllable Hives. All who do not fully understand the management and nature of bees would save themselves much trouble and perplexity, by procuring, to begin with, one or more healthy colonics in the Controllable Hive. Your chances of success in the end, and your profits of the first season, are greater from one swarm in this hive, than from six in second-class hives. If you purchase bees in inferior hives, you will need to exercise great care that they are not diseased. There is not one box or patent hive in fifty (as ordinarily managed) but that is deceased. They are either badly infested with the bee moth, have old, mouldy black combs, an old and diseased queen, or are in some way diseased. No matter how low the price paid for such stocks, they will be found expensive. Be sure to get none but the best to commence with; they are the cheapest in the end.