> In my mind it was a different strain of bee other then what was in this hive.
The great Huber made the same mistake... so don't feel bad.
"In 1809, we remarked something peculiar in the treatment of certain bees by their companions at the entrance of their hive. On the 20th of June, a cluster of workers attracted our attention; the bees composing it were so irritated that we durst not separate them; night approaching prevented us from ascertaining the cause of this assemblage; but on the subsequent days, we frequently observed bees occupied in defending the entrance of the same hive against some individuals whose external appearance was absolutely similar to that of ordinary workers, a few of them were seized: their difference consisted only in color, they were less downy on the thorax and abdomen, which gave them a blacker aspect; but as to the limbs, antennae, jaws, body and size, the whole external form presented perfect resemblance to common bees.
"Each day we saw some of these black bees at the entrance of the hive; it was evident that the workers expelled them; they had combats in which the ordinary worker always had the better; she soon killed her adversary or reduced it to such a state of weakness that it could not resist: she them would carry it off between her teeth to a great distance from the hive. We caught a number of the black bees and introduced them into a vase; but they speedily darted upon each other and were reciprocally killed; others were confined in a glass sand-box with workers from the same hive; but no sooner had the latter observed them than they were attacked and destroyed.
"Each day we noticed a greater number of these proscribed bees; once driven from their native hive they never returned; so that when the sting spared them they perished of hunger.
"This singular scene continued during the whole remaining part of the good season; sometimes the black bees did not appear to be so cruelly treated by the workers; and they seemed modified a little from the former; their hate had lessened and they did not repeat their mutual encounters; but the rigor of the common bees soon resumed against them, and they were again expelled.
"We were not able to ascertain whether all the brood of this hive was attacked by this malady, or by the peculiar condition which rendered them odious to their companions, and we saw their number augment successively for several weeks, we had cause to fear that the entire offspring of the queen was affected. But at the end of September, black bees were no longer noticed; the colony had apparently suffered from the exile of so many individuals; it was weaker than previously; yet we were encour-aged as to the condition of the colony when we satisfied our-selves that the queen had not lost the faculty of laying eggs which produced workers perfect in every particular.
"From the month of April of the following year, we watched this colony and did not see a single black bee appear; the increase of workers was so great as to make us hope that it would swarm; but it did not happen that year (1810); we were then fully convinced that this anomaly, whatever it be, had affected only a part of the eggs of this queen.
"Several other questions presented themselves here; was the queen entirely cured of this disposition to produce monstrous individuals? Was this vice hereditary? What would be the consequences upon the queens produced from her?..."--Huber's New Observations On Bees, Vol II Chapter X
My guess is they were robbers...