Without changing any code, a given HQL query which does not hydrate child nodes begins to hydrate the child nodes after removing an index directly from the database. There were no updates done to the hbm.xml file nor any change to the code. The object being queried is reasonably complex. lazy loading is enabled for the relationships.

It seems strange that the behavior of Hibernate is dependent on the existence of an index in the database, even when no changes have taken place in the code or configuration. Obviously, I know the existence of the index can be determined by hibernate.

Under what situations and why would a query that does not hydration with an index start doing hydration without that index?

Thanks.

--Tim