Green County residents who get their water from a private well should test it every year or when they notice a change in the taste, color, or odor. Unlike people who live in a city or village and have their water tested by the municipality, private well owners are responsible for testing their own water. There are lots of important reasons to get your water tested, but mainly, it’s important to make sure your water is healthy for you and your family. 

According to the Wisconsin Department of Health Services’ County Environmental Health Profiles, in 2024, in Green County, nitrate was detected in many privately owned wells. Of the private wells tested in Green County, almost 20% had nitrate levels above the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) standard. Nitrate can be harmful to anyone. Infants who drink water with high nitrate levels are at risk of blue baby syndrome, a condition that limits the blood’s ability to carry oxygen throughout the body. Nitrate can lead to birth defects and may increase people’s risk for certain kinds of cancer. 

Other contaminants, like bacteria, can also contaminate well water. Bacteria like E. coli can make people sick with flu-like illnesses, leading to diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, cramps, or fever. Young children and people with weakened immune systems are at the greatest risk of getting seriously ill from bacteria in drinking water. 

Heavy metals such as lead and arsenic can also contaminate well water. Arsenic is naturally in drinking water, but high levels of it can be toxic. Wells that are near sites of environmental contamination or land where arsenic pesticides were used in the past might have elevated levels of arsenic. There is no safe level of exposure to lead, and lead can enter drinking water from plumbing materials like pipes, joints, and faucets. It’s recommended that private well owners test for these metals every five years. 

The only way to know for sure if your well water is contaminated is to test. Green County Public Health is available to help make the testing process simple for Green County residents. Our office has free well water test kits available at our office for community members to pick up. After getting a kit, simply take a water sample at home, and mail the water sample to the lab at UW-Stevens Point. Green County Public Health has a short video on our website and YouTube channel that shows step-by-step instructions on how to take a water sample. Community members do need to pay to ship the water sample and pay a fee to have the water sample tested, but the Wisconsin WellTAP program may be able to help cover these costs for some community members. 

The Wisconsin Well Testing Access Program (WellTAP) is available to help community members who have a burden that prevents them from testing their well water. The program provides no-cost private well water testing to people who are pregnant, have a weekend immune system, and children 12 and under, and meet certain income eligibility criteria. To learn more about this program, reach out to Green County Public Health by calling us at (608) 328-9390 or email info@greencountywi.org. 

To learn more about well water testing, please visit the Green County Public Health website: https://wi-greencounty.civicplus.com/394/Water-Testing.

— Bridget Zimmerman has been the Public Health Educator for the Green County Public Health Department.