TRANSFERRING BEES TO FRAME-HIVES. 179 



should now be found firmly fitted to the frame, and can 

 be at once placed in the new hive as far as possible in 

 the same order as the comb was when fixed in the skep, 

 but it is generally advisable to pass a couple of tapes 

 over frame and comb to prevent the latter afterwards 

 falling out of place. Some of the combs will now be 

 found not large enough to fill the frames ; if they be 

 plentiful, cut them into rectangular pieces, and so fill the 

 frame. The Bees will join all together, and they will 

 soon make a good sound comb ; but when combs are 

 scarce, and we cannot afford to waste any, cut the top 

 straight, and if the bottom bar be not reached, support 

 the comb with a wooden lath under its bottom edge, 

 under which pass two or more tapes, tying over the top 

 bar against which the comb should thus be tightly 

 pressed. If the vacancy between the lath and bottom 

 bar be not much, the lath may be wedged up tightly by 

 means of two or three old corks or like means. Should 

 the combs not reach along the whole length of the top 

 bar, it is as well to fasten on a strip of Worker comb as 

 a guide for the Bees to continue, or they will probably 

 build crooked. 



Care should be taken to preserve as much Worker 

 comb as possible, to pare the thick honey-cells away 

 until they are of the proper thickness, and to put the 

 combs in the right way upwards, that is, as they were 

 built. Very little Drone comb should be returned, and 

 that placed towards the sides of the hive. All the 

 parings of the combs, waste honey, &c., should be care- 

 fully collected into a feeding bottle, and given to the 

 Bees on the top of the hive ; they will re-store the honey, 

 so that little or no waste will occur, and it will assist 

 them in eliminating wax wherewith to fix and make 

 good the combs, which in the summer will generally be 



N 2 



