What is with these candles next to Google results? Is this a seasonal artifact? (screenshot)

[pingswept]

http://pingswept.org/google_candles.png

[dreish]

Removing any of the three words results in no candles.

They are clearly Kwanzaa candles -- red, black, and green.

Googling "kwanzaa" or "candles" does not produce the candles, but googling "kwanzaa candles" does.

"hanukkah candles" and "christmas ornaments" also result in decorations along the "sponsored links" box.

Must be a hash collision.

[Hexayurt → dreish]

Wow. Impressive analysis.

[terpua]

The images are coming from http://www.google.com/images/k3.gif

I thought it might be related to the keyword "solar" but looks like "solar module characterization" is the only thing that brings it out (I only tried 4 other combos with the word solar).

[pingswept → terpua]

I've been able to get it to happen more than once, but not every time. As far as I can tell, the candles only appear when there are ads on the right-hand side.

[pingswept]

Mysteriously, if you search for kwanzaa or kwanzaa candles, the candles appear. However, they do not appear for kwanzaa ham sandwich or kwanzaa dogs.

What the deuce?