The glass tubes and reed-stumps are laid here and there, in fine disorder, close to the heaps of cocoons and all in a horizontal position, for the Osmia will have nothing to do with upright reeds.

Although such a precaution is not indispensable, I take care to place some cocoons in each cylinder.
The hatching of some of the Osmiae will therefore take place under cover of the galleries destined to be the building-yard later; and the site will be all the more deeply impressed on their memory.

When I have made these comprehensive arrangements, there is nothing more to be done; and I wait patiently for the building-season to open.
My Osmiae leave their cocoons in the second half of April.

Under the immediate rays of the sun, in well-sheltered nooks, the hatching would occur a month earlier, as we can see from the mixed population of the snowy almond-tree.

The constant shade in my study has delayed the awakening, without, however, making any change in the nesting-period, which synchronizes with the flowering of the thyme.