242 
BEES AND BEE-KEEPING. 
into a small space, the two may be nearly in contact ; 
but where they are widely dispersed, each may stand 
3ft. or 4ft. from the old spot, with the object that 
the bees returning from the fields may be as likely 
to enter the one as the other. Should the stock 
appear to be getting more than the necessary number 
of bees, disguise it by some cover, or place it still 
farther from .the old position, to which bring it 
nearer in the opposite difficulty. Where space is 
very restricted, these same effects may be produced 
by simply rotating the hives or bottom boards, so 
that the mouths are more or less changed with regard 
to the points of the compass. If the driven swarm 
is to be sent away, it should be packed as a natural 
swarm (page 136), and the stock will then occupy 
its old stand. 
The bee-keeper who has sufficiently advanced to 
undertake the processes just described is not likely 
to look with favour upon skeps ; and since these can 
often be cheaply purchased, they are not unfrequently 
used for supplying the population for a frame hive. 
The latter, handled upon non-swarming methods, will 
almost invariably give better results if the whole 
population of the smaller skep, together with the 
combs and brood, be put within, so that no actual 
increase in number of stocks occurs ; and, indeed, 
converting two colonies in skeps into one in a frame 
hive, will often be found a most profitable arrange- 
ment ; the process in these cases becoming that 
of transferring, which may be quite logically treated 
here, since it involves the making of an artificial 
swarm as its preliminary step. After the removal 
