Queen/swarm observation

[Scadsobees]

I've always thought that even though we call her the queen, the workers have control over what happens in a hive.

In my obs. hive, it looks like they were planning on swarming.  Even though they are only 1 deep and 1 medium frame, there were extra bees hanging around.  Then they started about 5 or 6 swarm cells.  I thought a swarm was imminent.

The first QC was capped a few days ago.

Then that same day, I noticed that 2 of the cells were ripped open from the side, and the bees were re-absorbing the contents.  A queen had her head buried in an open cell doing something in there for quite a few minutes.  I thought perhaps she was a newly hatched virgin that I had missed (she's a bit small from having some comb restrictions) but I'm pretty sure I saw her laying eggs.

Then they repaired the queen cells, and it looked like they were working on the QC's again.

The bees have been doing practice swarming/clustering on the entrance of the hive, to the point of one night a small cluster hung off of the entrance on the side of the house for the whole night.  Small swarm (from a small hive) and I couldnt' find the queen in the hive, I'm sure that she was in that swarm/cluster.  Then, this morning they all went back in.

Now the queen is laying again in the hive, there are still extra bees in there.  I don't think that the QC's are active any more.

Really confusing. :?  I don't think that I'm even going to try to understand.

Rick