Noticed a lot of Drones

On this one hive. I done a quick inspection 8 days ago. I only pulled a few frames. I saw eggs, larvae, and capped brood, and I filled the feeder. I also saw 2 Queen cells on the top of 2 different frames. (about a inch below the top bar) Everything look normal. Today (8 days later) I make it back to refill feeders. I crack the outer cover on this same hive and a cloud of bees come out of it. I just freeze holding the outer cover cracked open and let them settle down. As they are flying around I notice these are a bunch of Drone bees flying around. They come back to the hive and they are a bunch of big fat Drones. They were a lot of worker bees on the frames but there were also a lot of Drones I saw just on the top of the frames. If I had to guess I would say about a 100 or so. I just never saw this many Drones before so I'm wondering if I have a problem. Is a lot of Drones normal? Could I have a drone laying Queen? If so how do I fix it. I do not think it is a laying worker because last week I did see eggs and only 1 in the cells and they were on the bottom. I am new and need some advice on these Drones.

Thanks
DJ

I've heard that drones can tell when a hive is about to make queens and they congregate there.

You might just have a happy hive! Or, you might have a drone laying queen. Check out your capped brood, here is a link to a page that will help you distinguish between drone and worker brood. If you see plenty of worker brood, then you can breathe a sigh of relief, because nothing is wrong. If you see only drone brood, you got issues and most likely need to requeen.

Thanks for the reply's. From what I can tell it looks like mostly worker brood. Active, I think your right, it is just a big, strong, happy hive. I will keep my eye on them...Thanks again.

DJ

No problem!

Sometimes the workers will push the drones to one area in preparation for their final demise. I have opened a hive only to see drones rush out; my guess has always been the workers are starving them out and when I open the hive I foil the plan (at least at the moment)

Like was said just keep an eye on the brood and you can tell if it is all drone.

It would be "normal" to have 300-400 or more drones in a healthy hive during mating season.

Thanks for the replays. I feel better now.