>I have a five frame nuc that. under inspection, had three frames of capped brood with one frame with three capped queen cells and one uncapped queen cell all of which were in the swarm position on the frame.

I would suspect that they built queen cells because they are overcrowded and the queen has little (if any) space in which to lay.  I would knock off the cells and move the colony to a larger  hive (as you have done).

>I also have capped drone brood in most of my hives, but none of them would have emerged and matured sufficiently in time to mate with the emerging queens.

I have had queens mate six weeks after emerging, so would not write off the chances of your drones maturing sufficiently.  But if eliminating the overcrowding solves the problem then that will not be relevant.

Even if they decide to build more cells you will have bought a week or two.

Best wishes

Peter 
52°14'44.44"N, 1°50'35"W 

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