Queen cells !

Queen cells - 3 of 'em - in Hive Amidala. Today's inspection went well apart from that. I spotted eggs in that hive, though the queen eluded me. I'm guessing she's still in there......

What to do?

It's all somewhat complicated by where the queen cells are. I've recently moved onto a deep brood box in which there are lots of deep frames and one normal depth frame which I had moved into that box when I introduced it a few weeks ago. THAT'S where the queen cells are: beneath the shallower frame. This greatly confuses the typical "artificial swarm" techniques I read in the books. These are the first queen cells I've had to deal with, and I am looking for answers. A made-up variation on the books' version of the artificial swarm springs to mind - I will think this through further. I'm also tempted to employ one of my 3 new apidea mating hives. I'll get my thinking cap on and report back. Tomorrow's weather forecast is good. I'll need to spring into action then.

As a footnote - I had planned to put another super on Hive Amidala, but the old standard depth brood (acting as a large super above the queen excluder) is still only one third / one half full of honey. These bees are not swarming due to lack of space. And they're still cracking on with drawing comb in the the new deep brood box area, so that's not why either. I guess they just want to swarm. Anyway, thinking cap on....