You are welcome.
Just as a general FYI. The Saskatraz mentioned ... is a CarniolanXRussian based stock crossed with specific others and multi-year selection in a very tightly controlled (aka Alkatraz) locale. If you are interested in them you can check into and read up on the breed and research program at:
http://www.saskatraz.com/index.htmIn the US, you can get the Sask HYBRIDS from Oliverez - as the only approved/certified and genuine source outside of Canada.
Be aware that while the hybrids are decent, they do not carry all the desirable traits and the odd one can be a bit hot. The hybrids are good to get to setup for raising lots of pedigree drones, for your own in-house breeding. However, do not graft off the hybrids.
If I were restarting an apiary build out such as you described my plan would likely be:
- source local bees and queens with a strong preference for Carni to populate the minimal equipment I need to get things going.
- source a carni breeder queen, if possible or just pick out the one I like best from the purchased bees. Pick the darkest queen that is throwing the darkest hairiest bees.
- get at least 3 hybrid saskatraz and set those up with 2 to 3 drone frames each. Ensure they are strong populations and feed those colonies lots of pollen/sub to support mass drone rearing. Check them weekly, destroying queen cells, they may make lots once well established, do not be tempted to use those QCs.
- once those things are done, carryon to build out my apiary and fill all of my equipment by splitting with MY MATED queens (never ever walk away splits), have a mating yard of mating nucs grafted from my choicest carni queen and supported by the skz drone hives located there, use only my own raised queens from said stocks for my hives and for grafting.
- make lots of extras in the mating yard to give away or sell the cells and queens to all of my closest neighbours so as to propagate the preferred genetics into the airways all around me.
Hope that helps!
Have fun with it.
.