HC Mist's Return 13R is a full Irish bull we raised and used here for the last 4 years. He is an ET son of Highfield Irish Mist and Waymar J&J Strawberry 96. Highfield Irish Mist was our first Irish import, and we brought him from Ireland in 1974. I refer to him as a once in a lifetime bull, as he consistently settled over 100 cows per year, in three herds with one of them being 1000 miles from here. He died of a twisted gut on the operating table at the U of S vet college when he was 14 years old. He never needed his feet trimmed and his daughters were excellent producing females. If you look back in many of the Canadian Shorthorn pedigrees today, you will probably find Irish Mist one or more times in their background. For example, Saskvalley Pioneer 126P, our 06 Canadian National Champion bull, had Irish Mist in his background 8 times.
The dam of Mist's Return is Waymar J&J Strawberry 96, who is still producing here at age 14. She will be flushed again this spring. I have posted a picture of her here, and you may recognize her, as she has been pictured on here before. She has been a great producing female for us and has also been an excellent egg producer. She produced over 100 grade 1 embryos in 6 flushes and I have none left. Her embryos have sold to many breeders in the US, Canada, Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales.
Mist's Return is the easiest calving bull we have ever used... ever. He has been used on our heifers for 4 years, and his fourth calf crop is now arriving. So far, we have only assisted one calf at birth from him, which was a backwards calf, in those 4 years. Probably the main reason he calves so easily is that he has the shortest gestation length of any Shorthorn bull we have ever used. His calves are very vigorous at birth and are up and going in minutes after being born. They are moderate framed and do not win many growth contests, however, they are functional and very sound structurally. They also have amazing hair... like muskox. It is so thick you can hardly pull a comb through it.
I sold Mist's Return last August after using him for 4 years. I am wondering if I should have done this, but I decided to sell him, when I was offered a very good price for him after we had finished using him. I have semen here that is eligible for sale in Canada, but I haven't got any exportable semen. Since I have sold him, I have had interest from the US, Ireland and Australia on him. He was a white horned bull, so I never thought we would ever sell enough semen to pay the extra costs of collecting exportable semen. Here is a picture of Mist's Return as a two year old, and a picture of his dam at almost 12 years of age.
I have only got two daughters in the herd by Mist's Return as all of the other heifers sired by him have been sold as breeding stock. The third picture is a Mist's Return heifer out of a Salute two year old ( a full sister to our Timeline bull). This heifer sold to Minnesota last fall.
