From Ashes to Branded Wind: The Making of Shiloh Moore

By the time the wildfire swept through the Oregon high desert in the summer of 2012, Shiloh Moore already knew she wasn’t destined for a simple life of fence posts and cattle drives. Horses had always been her calling — but it was in the smoke and aftermath of the Long Draw Fire that her true path found her.

She was twenty-one, out of high school and splitting her days between the family’s cattle operation and riding out with seasoned mustang trainers. That summer, the flames left behind more than blackened pastureland. They scattered wild bands, displaced livestock, and forced a community to rally together.

“I remember the heat,” Shiloh recalls. “The sky was orange for days. We were just trying to get animals moved, fencing patched, anything to help.”

Among the displaced mustangs was a wary dun filly with a sharp eye and a refusal to back down. Shiloh named her Cimarrona.

“She wasn’t supposed to be mine,” Shiloh admits. “But something about her — the way she stood her ground, the way she refused to give in — I recognized that stubborn streak. It felt familiar.”

Cimarrona: The Mare Who Started It All

She isn’t the flashiest horse on the ranch. Her dun coat has dulled with age, and a hitch has crept into her stride thanks to the early signs of arthritis. But for those who know the story, Cimarrona — “Rona” — is more than just another horse in the pasture. She’s the mare who shaped Shiloh Moore’s future.

Now in her mid-teens, Rona isn’t asked to take on long, grueling rides anymore. “We keep the big days behind us,” Shiloh says, “but don’t think for a second she’s retired. If I grab a saddle, she still pricks her ears like a filly. She wants to go. Always has.”

These days, Rona plays a quieter but no less important role at Branded Wind. She’s a teacher in her own right — steadying the greenhands who come through the ranch, showing younger mustangs that the human world isn’t so bad. “She sets the tone,” Shiloh explains. “If the old mare’s calm, the rest follow.”

Her arthritis may slow her down, but her spirit remains untouched. The odd ride down a fenceline, a trot across the pasture — those are still hers to claim. “She’s earned the right to choose her pace,” Shiloh adds with a smile.

And when she’s turned out with the herd at dusk, her silhouette against the fading sky, Cimarrona stands as a reminder of resilience: a wildfire filly who rose from smoke and ashes to become the living heart of Branded Wind.

Earlier Lessons

Rona wasn’t Shiloh’s first brush with mustangs, though. That came earlier, when she was just seventeen. Her parents had stepped in to foster an orphaned colt, and together the Moores took on the challenge of gentling him.

“I still remember those nights, sitting in the barn with that colt, just breathing with him,” Shiloh says. “That was the horse that taught me patience, that taught me to listen before I spoke. Looking back, that was the real beginning. Rona just… sealed it.”

Learning the Craft

After the fire, Shiloh threw herself deeper into the world of mustangs. She apprenticed under trainers who had spent decades proving the versatility of wild-caught horses. She learned the subtle art of pressure and release, the rhythm of groundwork, the importance of trust. And alongside her, in those years, was a young wrangler named Caleb Foster — seven years her junior, but already with a sharp eye for mustang behavior.

“Caleb and I both cut our teeth in the pens back then,” she says. “Different paths, same love. We swapped lessons without realizing it. He saw things I missed, and vice versa. It shaped us both.”

Over the years, Shiloh’s horsemanship deepened, and her reputation followed. She began competing in ranch horse versatility and cow work, proving what Kigers were capable of beyond the open range. It wasn’t about ribbons for her — it was about showing the world that these horses carried the same grit and heart she had seen in the smoke-darkened eyes of a wildfire filly.

Branded Wind Today

Today, Shiloh stands at the helm of Branded Wind, the training and breeding facility she and her sister Elena built from the ground up. Between training colts, mentoring apprentices, and still saddling up for the odd competition, her life remains bound to the horses that once rose from the ashes alongside her.

When asked what she sees in her future, Shiloh doesn’t hesitate. “More horses. More learning. More proving that mustangs belong — not just in the wild, but in every arena, every pasture, every heart that’ll have them.”

And with Cimarrona grazing in the background, ears flicking toward her rider’s voice, it’s clear that future is already well underway.