I would also like someone to help with the reference Alan Dick refers to
which showed that the rearing of the queen was more important than
the genetics of the queen.
 
The only direct reference to this subject I can recall is a 1981 article by
Steve Taber in the American Bee Journal entitled Scientific Queen
Rearing (January issue).  In the article Steve reports on work done by
C.L. Farrar in the '30's-'40's where he undertook a programme to
determine which of the many advertised bee stocks offered by queen
producers were best and could produce the most honey.
 
To start everything out equal, all queens were hived with two-pound
packages.  Some of the package colonies could barely make winter,
while others produced from 150 to 200 lbs of surplus.  However, one
producer consistently turned out queens that developed colonies which
produced from 250 to 400 lbs of surplus.
 
According to Steve, Farrar came to the conclusion that the stock from
this particular queen rearer was not any better genetically than that
available anywhere else.  Farrar found that when they reared queens
from the queen rearer's stock and stock obtained from the poorer
performing stock, all resulting stocks performed similarly.  Steve says in
the article that "it wasn't the stock that so so good, it was the queen
breeder himself" (ie, the way he reared his queens).  The thing that
stood out in his queen rearing was his care and selection of each queen
and queen cell at every step of the production cycle.
 
I don't think this is the work Alan is referring to, so I would be very
interested in hearing if there has been subsequent research which
supports Steve Taber's contention that the rearing is more important than
the genetics.