[Oberlinmom]

I'm a little befuddled today. I captured a really nice swarm that I thought was my Carnolians. My hive had been making swarm cells. I'd tried to fool them by removing frames of brood, larva, capped queen cell and nurse bees adding empties then dumping the queen and workers our front of the new emptier hive and letting them walk in. When I saw the swarm I figured it didn't work.
I captured the swarm and left them alone for several days in an empty hive. Today I did a queen search. There were so many bees I didn't find her but all the bees were golden, almost orange not a black body besides the drones. I checked the "original" hive and didn't spot the queen. It's a two deep plus medium hive and still is very busy. Lots of nectar, capped brood, larva.. I didn't see any eggs but of course the sun rolled behind a cloud right when I started that. Do you think I just lucked out on a stray swarm??
Or can bee lines blur?

 

[RayMarler]

Yea, I say you got a stray swarm. Your hive, if it just swarmed, should have queen cells in it or emerged queen cells that have not been torn down yet. Since it still looks strong and in full production mode, no queen cells spotted (at least you did not mention finding any) plus the swarm sounds more cordovan color, then sounds more like a free swarm for you.