There are a lot of companies selling packages of bees, generally large ones. Are there any suppliers of natural or small cell bees, that have already been regressed? I'm already planning for next year (I admit it, openly, I'm totally hooked on beekeeping), and I want to do best by my bees. If starting with natural sized bees will save me 4 or 5 years of regressing them, it's worth it, IMHO.
Not that I will scrap the hives I have now, but I'm definitely going to add an observation hive and a third lang to my backyard apiary. After those, I have to start finding new places for my hives, due to the restrictions of my yard plot size (0.19 acres).
I'd ultimately like go get to at least 10, and with quite a few farms around, I don't think finding a place for them will be a problem, but I want to take it easy and work my way up. Can't afford to drop 3 grand on hives and bees to boost up in one year.
I buy nucs from fatbeeman in GA - he ships them, they are great, Small Cell, Russians or NWC. Order early, he sells out quickly. http://www.geocities.com/fatbeeman (http://www.geocities.com/fatbeeman)
Just watch out for Buckeye Bees in Ohio. I know they use to offer small cell. Do a search on here and Beesource before making any purchases from them.