How long before a new Queen starts laying

So I had to work away for the last few weeks and entrusted my hive to a local beek. Apparently he decided not to bother looking in on it and subsequently on my return I found 6-8 hatched Queen cells and no grubs, little capped brood and a heap of capped drone cells.
I’m hoping there is a new Queen in there somewhere but couldn’t find her, just wondering how long it should take a new Queen to start laying and where to go from here

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If the drone brood is in worker comb, chances are you have a laying worker. You may still have a lot of unhatched drones in drone comb because they are about 4 days slower than workers at hatching. All of your workers have probably hatched by now. If you don’t have drone larvae in worker comb, I would give it another 7-10 days, then take a look for new eggs or even young larvae. Look in the area where the most bees are. Good luck with that, cheers

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Thanks Jeff
The capped drones are all in drone comb so I will wait and check in a week.

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http://www.thebeeyard.org/queen-rearing-calendar/

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