I've been tied up for a few days, so didn't get around to responding for a bit.

>>We successfully raised quality queens in mid-May in Central Alberta so, it should be possible in Southern Vancouver Island

This I agree with, in fact, if I was on the southern end of the island around Victoria I think it would be possible to start grafting already by the last week of March, and have queens ready for May 1.  But I'm not in the south.  If you are in Victoria, get on hiway 19 and drive north for 5 hours, then you can stop in here for a coffee.  Our season runs considerably later than that in Victora, by around 5 weeks.  In my time of attending club meetings up and down the island as a BCHPA rep, one of the things that became obvious to me, the bee season runs about a week later for every hour of driving you do headed up the island on hiway 19.  Or if you are driving south like I was, it's a week earlier for every hour you drive.

But we digress, the original subject was banking queens on a small scale in a northern climate in order to have mated queens available earlier in the season than they can be produced.  My comment then, and I'll stand by it, a bank for a dozen queens will use up the resources of 3 normal sized colonies.  That same amount of resources will populate 3 boxes split as 4 way with half size frames, and you end up with less risk.  In either case there are a dozen queens at risk for the winter, but in the case of a bank, failure in the bank loses all of them.  In separate individual little colonies, you dont lose them all if one colony fails.

And then another little side benefit, when you do go to start your first cells in the spring, the mating colonies are already populated, have brood on the frames, no muss, no fuss trying to populate little boxes with bulk bees. 

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