weirdest thing!

[mazza]

I encountered the weirdest thing this week, and wondered if anyone else had seen this before.

While prepping the hives for winter, my bee partner and I found a fourth bee colony we didn't know we had! The varroa floor insert of the third hive wouldn't slide into place, and when we checked underneath to see why we found comb after comb of natural comb hanging down from the mesh floor! A quick check inside the hive revealed the marked queen present and correct, so we moved the 'top' colony onto a new floor and stand and investigated further... Only to find about 8 natural combs, plenty bees, and both brood and eggs!! It appears that at some point back at 'swarming time' a new colony thought that was as good a place as any to set up home - under the mesh floor of another colony!

Is this very unusual, or has anyone else had this happen to them?