Has anyone watched a queen chew up queen cup?

[D Coates]

Queen cup not queen cell.  I'm trying to get my OB hive queen to start some swarm cells.  The population is getting pretty high and cups are starting to show up.  I notice 2 right next to each other that apparently started Yesterday as I worked the hive on Sunday.  They were getting pretty deep and I was thinking they may be active though I could not see into them.  I was looking at them during lunch and notice the queen was nearby.  I was really hoping to see her lay in them.  Almost on Que, I watched her head over to them and examine them closely sticking her head and thorax in up to the 2nd scale of abdomen.  She then withdrew and began to tear at the edges with her mandibles agitating the workers around her.  She then repeated the process on the Q cup next to it.  She repeated this at least a couple more times on each cell.

Has anyone else seen this?  Any idea of what this means (other than I'm not laying in that!)?

[Michael Bush]

It sounds interesting.  No I've never seen that.