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Roundup 171 | Weekly Roundup with Robbie and Ashlee - The Origins Foundation Podcast | Wave AI Podcast Notes

Roundup 171 | Weekly Roundup with Robbie and Ashlee

Wed Apr 29 2026

Robbie and Ashlee are back after Robbie has been across the pond for 16 days. They recap his trip to Vienna, Slovenia and the UK and discuss predator management (or lack thereof), the abrupt cancellation of the House vote on the ESA Amendments Act, the citizen-led ballot initiative in CO to amend the constitution to protect the Right to Hunt and Fish, a similar initiative in OH, a couple of CWD bills in Louisiana and more.

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Origins Foundation Podcast

Episode: Roundup 171 | Weekly Roundup with Robbie and Ashlee

Date: April 29, 2026
Hosts: Robbie and Ashlee

Episode Overview

This weekly roundup episode, hosted by Robbie and Ashlee, provides a deep dive into several current issues in wildlife management, hunting policy, and conservation both in the U.S. and the U.K. The hosts reflect on recent travels through Europe, highlight the challenges of predator management, discuss legislative developments like the U.S. Endangered Species Act Amendments, and comment on evolving state-level wildlife debates. The episode is colored by their candid banter, irreverent humor, and passion for hard-hitting, nuanced discussion in the sustainable use space.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Robbie’s Recent Travel Adventures (00:49–10:15)

Robbie recounts a 16-day trip spanning Austria and England, including a stay above a centuries-old English pub (“The Globe”) in Buckfastleigh, on the edge of Dartmoor. He describes the challenging yet humorous conditions and local color, like navigating cramped, ancient rooms and noisy slot machines at night.
- Notable Quote:
  “There’s a sweet spot with a gun, you know, too heavy and it’s a burden to walk with. Too light and you whipping it.” – Robbie [00:00]
The story shifts to a memorable night in Vienna, where Robbie attends a private mass at the city’s largest cathedral thanks to connections made at a major wildlife conservation conference (CIC).
Ashlee and Robbie exchange personal travel dreams and tales of European seasonal traditions like the Christmas markets.
- Memorable moment:
  The anecdote of an elderly German lady sitting in the premium economy seats Robbie was downgraded to—only for a flight attendant to scold her, after which Robbie graciously allows her to stay.
  – [11:04–12:56]

2. The Importance of Predator Management in the UK (18:01–29:27)

Robbie details the filming of a new documentary, “Why Moorlands Matter,” aimed at educating politicians and the public about the ecological necessity of managed predator control on England’s grouse moors, particularly for the survival of red-listed ground-nesting birds.
- Key Explanation:
  In the UK, “shooting” refers to hunting birds; “stalking” is for deer/hard game.
  – [18:58–19:38]
Contrasts are drawn between regions with intensive predator management (yielding thriving populations of rare ground-nesting birds) and areas like Dartmoor, where hands-off “rewilding” results in the near absence of such species.
Discussion of land tenure in Dartmoor, where private ownership coexists with “commoner” grazing rights and universal public access (“right to roam”), creating management complexity.
- Notable Quote:
  “You can't say one is bad and one is good because it’s all based on judgment and value of what you see in the landscape.” – Robbie [22:44]
Points out the class tensions underlying British debates (“the Lords” own the moors; working-class/urban activists oppose predator management), and highlights the similar ideological battles in the U.S. around rewilding, predator species, and hunting.
- Notable Quote:
  “The more we get into these different environments with these different issues, it’s the same issue all over the world.” – Robbie [30:16]

3. U.S. Conservation Policy: ESA Amendments & Legislative Frustrations (30:38–36:19)

Endangered Species Act Amendments:
Ashlee explains the recent political stall on the ESA reform bill. She provides a behind-the-scenes look at why the measure was abruptly pulled, the challenge of including too many amendments (especially surrounding economic considerations), and the likelihood of future compromise.
- Quote:
  “Nobody you talk to behind the scenes says, yeah, this is great, this is ideal. ...But they also don’t necessarily want all of the amendments that are wrapped up into this.” – Ashlee [32:00]
The segment outlines procedural drama, contrasts it with competing national conservation priorities in the federal budget, and notes widespread cuts impacting agencies like the Forest Service and Fish & Wildlife.
- Notable Quote:
  “Depending on what group you’re with and what you focus on, that’s kind of what you’re hearing about in the budget.” – Ashlee [35:38]

4. State-Level Policy: Colorado’s Citizen-Led Wildlife Management & Louisiana’s CWD Debate (37:32–43:18)

Colorado:
Excitement over a citizens’ petition (IP200, targeting a 2026 ballot measure) to reshape state wildlife management. Ashlee underscores the challenge: all signatures must be gathered in person.
- Quote:
  “If they will just all turn out for this, they can get this passed 100%. But they've got to vote because it'll take 55% of the vote, but they can do that.” – Ashlee [37:55]
Louisiana:
Coverage of controversial bills around Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) control:
- One proposed law would eliminate all CWD regulations.
- Others offer compromise, shrinking zones and allowing some feeding, aiming to maintain agency authority while appeasing key stakeholder groups.
- Notable Quote:
  “I personally wish that they would not do that. I don't agree...with feeding in CWD zones at all because it helps artificially congregate the deer. But they would rather this bill pass as a sort of compromise…than have all authority stripped from the agency and no CWD regulations.” – Ashlee [41:19]

5. Personal Notes & Looking Ahead (43:31–45:28)

The duo gives a shoutout to friend Travis Thompson recovering from health issues, wishing him well and welcoming his return to banter on Instagram.
- Quote:
  “We love you, Travis, and we hope you’re feeling better, buddy.” – Ashlee [43:36]
Robbie outlines upcoming projects:
- Three weeks more on rhino work in South Africa
- Mozambique filming with a noted conservationist
- Screening an elephant documentary in Kenya (where hunting is banned)—with anticipation and a bit of nerves about local reactions
- A trip to France for a film premiere

Notable Quotes & Moments

“Ivory, in my opinion, was the plastic of its age.” – Robbie [00:00]
“It’s like snakes and ladders. You guys are climbing the ladder and then somebody does something stupid and you just slide down.” – Robbie [00:00]
“Could you imagine? ...Friday night, four cameramen and...we bust open the front door of the bar because we have to go through the bar to get up to our rooms.” – Robbie [06:04]
“This whole predator thing...it’s like oh how dare you, you’re going to eradicate the predators. No you’re not. You’re just suppressing them.” – Robbie [30:16]
“Politics comes down to compromise, right?” – Robbie [43:18]
“If anyone wants to give us a shout out, touch base, give us any topics you want us to discuss...We appreciate everybody weighing in and appreciate you joining us.” – Ashlee [45:28]

Timestamps for Important Segments

| Segment | Timestamp | |---------|-----------| | UK Travel Stories & Pub Adventures | 00:49–10:15 | | Vienna Conference & Mass | 13:15–15:06 | | Austrian Gun Makers & Turkish Walnut | 15:26–18:01 | | UK Predator Management, Grouse Moors | 18:01–29:27 | | ESA Amendments Discussion | 30:38–36:19 | | U.S. Federal Budget Cuts | 35:35–36:19 | | Colorado & Louisiana Wildlife Policy | 37:32–43:18 | | Personal Shout-outs & Upcoming Projects | 43:31–45:28 |

Episode Tone & Language

The conversation weaves humor and casual banter with earnest, expert commentary. The hosts stay frank and approachable, willing to critique both their own community and "outsiders," and are open about the challenges facing conservation globally.

Conclusion

Robbie and Ashlee’s weekly roundup delivers an engaging blend of travelogue, ecological insight, and legislative analysis. With pointed anecdotes, policy breakdowns, and a sense of camaraderie, the episode exemplifies The Origins Foundation Podcast’s commitment to championing conservation and “telling the truth about hunting”—even, and especially, when it’s complicated.

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Transcript

Robbie (0:00)

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Co-host (1:15)

The expenses are going up.

Robbie (1:17)

It goes a long way with families.

Co-host (1:19)

We have families that do need it.

Robbie (1:21)

Me close this door because I have a little wiener dog. What you. Are you laughing because I said wiener?

Co-host (1:26)

I'm really glad you finished the sentence out. I'm sorry the first happened. What are we doing here today?

Robbie (1:34)

You're telling the whole world.

Co-host (1:45)

I. E there to check it. New app and everything.

Robbie (1:49)

Whenever I'm traveling, people are just like, oh, Robbie, you know, you have the most amazing life. You travel so much. You travel all over the world. And that is absolutely true. I absolutely love, love, love, love what I do. However, I think in the last. How long have I been gone now? 16 days on this last jaunt.

Co-host (2:12)

Has it been 16 days?

Robbie (2:14)

11th to the 27th. 16th. Now I came home yesterday. 11th to the 26th.

Co-host (2:21)

Robbie (6:04)

Well, there was also Lauren. So Lauren downstairs as we all walked in late, right? We were all just like buggered. We've been filming all night, all day. We then went off and had dinner with the guy that we were filming. His name was Prof. Charles and Prof. Was just amazing. Just amazing guy. He's been an environmental ecologist for 2028 years. He's been working the Dartmoor system for 25 years. Just an amazing cat. Loves photography, bird photography. And we walked in. Could you imagine? This is the scene Friday night, four cameramen and three cameramen myself. We all have all of our gear. We bust open the front door of the bar because we have to go through the bar to get up to our rooms. It is 2026 and my friends, big changes have happened in the world of firearm suppressors. The 200 tax stamp fee is now gone. Huge win for hunters, huge win for shooters, and a huge win for your wallets. If you're thinking about elevating your shooting experience and adding a suppressor, Silence Essential is the best way to shop. And you don't even have to get off your couch to do it. Go to silence essential.com, browse hundreds of suppressor options. They literally have all of the popular makes and models. Then their experts will walk you through setting up your account, creating a free NFA trust, and then submitting your application to the atf. Once approved, Silencer Central ships your new suppressor directly to your door. That's when you're going to have to essentially get off the couch. It's a game changer, guys. If you haven't done it yet, do it. The old days of waiting eight to 10 months on a suppressor are gone. It's more like two weeks. Some have even gotten their suppressors in shorter timeframes. It's never been easier to start shooting suppressed. Get started today by visiting silencercentral.com it's really the simplest way to get your suppressors. Bushnell is eager to help you get set up for conservation success. That's right. They want to help you. The conservation and research community is dominated by good people doing good things and investing significant time and effort for the benefit of habitat and the species. So what do you need to do? Pretty simple. Send us your conservation story and or your conservation wish could be managing whitetails, could be understanding your environment or species or something else related to conservation. What would you be able to do if you had a great trail camera setup? We will select the best story every other month and send you a camera bundle. Cell camera, normal, SD camera, SD cards as well as optics. Everything you need to get set up for success. I can't wait to see what you submit. You can email us, DM us, message us whatever you want. We are not hard to find. Good luck. And there's the locals. It's not jam packed, but there's like, you know, 10, 12 people in the bar. They all look at us and obviously they all know who we are because the proprietors behind the bar has told them about these chaps living upstairs because clearly nobody else has decided to book a room. We have booked the rooms and we walk past and there's a guy in the. As I said to him, he was in his denim tuxedo, denim. Denim jacket, denim jeans, Canadian tuxedo. Canadian tuxedo. Can hardly understand a word he's saying to me. Deep British accent. And Lauren is sitting next to him. And Lauren goes, where are you guys from? And I know, I say, who are they from? I say, I'm from Memphis, Tennessee. She puts out her hand like this and I ob. I obviously shake her hand and she was like, you're a handsome fella, aren't you? Like, pleasure to be Jack. As I was going up the stairs, Jack is like, are you sure Lauren's not following you up here?

Robbie (23:37)

Not Dartmoor. So Dartmoor is interesting. Dartmoor is owned by the crown, but it's also. I'm going to get this wrong, which it's so convoluted, but it's also owned by commoners. And the commoners have the rights to the grounds for grazing. So if you and me decided we can go in and buy a piece of Dartmoor, we can. But the commoners have grazing rights, so they can come onto our and graze whatever they want. There's no shooting rights anymore on Dartmoor. Even if you did have them. There's nothing to shoot. But like this, this place. Hey, tour. We were sitting in the car park, hundreds of people going up to see the. The tour, which is amazing. Hundreds of vehicles, motorbikes, bikers, dogs off leads running everywhere, which again, I'd do it. My dog, I'd love my dog go roaming around, but my dog's gonna eat those. Dogs are eating nest eggs, are disturbing nests, that kind of stuff. And then it's essentially created this little honey pot. And this honey pot is. Are people. You know, people are dropping a chip, french fries, whatnot. And in. In the 45 minutes that we're there, We must have seen 24 crows. And I'm not talking like the little crows we have here, like the big proper corvids, right? And those crows just hang out there and they get all the scraps from people and then they go and find whatever else is in the bushes, right. I E. Ground nesting birds. And so I'm saying all this to say I'm not saying that's bad, right. And I spoke to the ice cream guy. There was a guy selling ice cream. We filmed my interaction with the ice cream guy and I said, you realize that there's no grouse or curlew or lapping or anything here. He's like, really? And I explained to him, like, why there's none. He goes, oh, okay, that makes sense. I said, but this isn't bad. Like, if this is what you want, there's generalist bird species around, right? There's, there's some crows, there's crows, skylarks, there's. There may be a meadow pipet that comes in, but that's it. That's it. And so like when we were up north at this Moira state, actually I saw probably 30 curlews in 45 minutes. And when I, when we were about to leave, he's like, just remember how many curlews you saw because you're probably not going to see another curlew after you leave this property.

Co-host (39:55)

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Louisiana has kind of had a crazy situation going on down there. There's been a big, it's been a little on the down low, but they have had a couple of bills. Well, they've, well they've had a bunch of bills in all different. There's. If anybody follows menhaden, there's been a thousand menhaden bills and some good ones have been moving. We're not going to go into that right now because that we could talk for two hours about the poggy bills but we are going to talk about a couple of important ones. And I know the National Deer association has been monitoring these but there was a bill introduced to basically eliminate all CWD regulations period from the state. So basically take all power away from wildlife agency. Right. Just, just top to bottom, no justification, no scientific basis, no more input from the agency, just remove it. And so because there was a real worry that that bill could pass a couple of very sportsman minded senator, well one senator and one house member, Senator Womack and Representative Reiser who we've had on our podcast introduced another bill which at first look it's not perfect. I wish they didn't have to do this but they introduced a bill as a sort of compromise to shrink the existing CWD zone. Right now it's like a 15 mile and a 25 mile radius and baiting is not allowed at all. You can't supplementally feed within the zone because they just had a new positive in a parish that had not had a pause of before. And so that parish went into the zone and so ordinarily you could not feed it all during the year. And so what they did was this, under this new. It's a joint resolution that they've introduced, you would still be allowed to feed between September 1st and March 1st. So slightly before and slightly after the end of de deer season statewide. I personally wish that they would not do that. I don't agree, as you know, with feeding in CWD zones at all because it helps artificially congregate the deer. But they would rather this bill pass as a sort of compromise between people down there that want to be able to feed no matter what and then have all authority stripped from. From the agency and no CWD regulations. So I agree.