I'm curious what other beekeepers would have done in this particular
situation...
 
I obtained my hive as a nuc from a local beekeeper.  Because I
physically brought my hive body to him (in the back of my car) to
transfer the nuc, I had my deep attached to the bottom board with hive
staples.
 
This made installing a slatted rack a bit more interesting, though.
If I'd been thinking ahead when I hammered the staples, I would've
left a little space (i.e., not pounded them in quite the whole way) so
that they could be easily pried off without having to move the hive.
But I wasn't thinking ahead, so I couldn't get enough leverage to
slide something under the staples to pry them off without doing
something like tilting the hive on its side, which I did *not* want to
do.
 
What I wound up doing was constructing another hive (bottom board,
slatted rack, and super), and playing switcheroo with the hives
(moving the old hive, placing the new hive where the old one was, and
transferring all ten frames from the old hive into the new one).  I
conducted quick looks for the queen while transferring the frames, but
I didn't see her.  (I didn't see her in the old brood box after I
transferred all 10 frames, either, so I feel fairly confident she was
just hiding out on one of the frames, and did indeed make it into the
new hive body.)
 
So, my question is: can anyone suggest a better way I might've handled
this situation?  My first error was probably making the staples too
difficult to remove, but since I couldn't remove them in-place, the
only way I could see to put in the slatted rack was to make another
hive and transfer the frames.  Was there something else I could've
done, but didn't see?
 
Thanks,
James