Quick hits: Black Appalachian music; cicada cooking; long-term agricultural issues; longing for your hometown

Want a snack? Cicadas could be on the menu.
(Washington Post photo by Allison Dinner)

Here's a roundup of stories with rural resonance; if you do or see similar work that should be shared on The Rural Blog, email heather.chapman@uky.edu.

President Biden has a 23 percent approval rating among white evangelicals, according to new data from the Pew Research Center. In general, Biden's approval rating among various religious affiliations is nearly the reverse of former President Trump's at the same point in his presidency. Read more here.

Insects could be the wave of the future for cheap protein in animal feed. But if you want to give it a whirl yourself, here's how to catch and cook cicadas (which will soon be plentiful as the Brood X batch surfaces after 17 years). Read more here.

A new study evaluates how laws banning tobacco-product sales to people under 21 have affected electronic cigarette use in rural and urban youth. Read more here.

The Agricultural Economic Insights team lists of the top 10 "front burner" issues that could affect the farm economy for years to come. That includes the pandemic, lingering effects of African swine fever, child nutrition policy, and immigrant-related farm-labor issues. Read the rest here.

A lawsuit by doctors who advocate plant-based diets claims Department of Agriculture dietary guidelines are driven by meat and dairy marketing concerns, not nutrition. Read more here.

More small towns are offering cash bonuses and more to attract new residents. Read more here.

Kids with a desk and a quiet place to study do better in school, research shows. Read more here.

Research shows that California's carbon-credit system actually allowed polluters to add millions of tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Read more here.

The Smoky Mountain Air podcast is kicking off a new series exploring Black Appalachian music. Listen to the first episode here.

Apply for one of these science, health and environmental reporting fellowships by 6 p.m. ET May 10.

New author Rainesford Stauffer reflects in The Atlantic on how she couldn't wait to move away from Owensboro, Ky., pop. 55,000, when she was a teenager, but has found herself longing for it ever since. Many small-town natives move to big cities in their 20s, she writes, but wonders if they might find just as much fulfillment from staying home. Read more here.

The Justice Department says the federal government never instructed Tyson Foods to keep its plants open in the early months of the pandemic. That's according to documents in a federal lawsuit against the department from four relatives of meatpacking workers who died from Covid-19. It many have broad implications for similar lawsuits elsewhere. Read more here.