Map of Mercury in Fish and Seafood in Ogeechee and Canoochee Rivers and Georgia's Coast

A Note to the Reader:  This map is provided for your information purposes only.  Please refer to the Guidelines for Eating Fish from Georgia's Waters when making a decision about how much fish to eat from the Ogeechee, Canoochee or coastal areas.

How to read this map:  Click on one of the fish icons to look at the levels of mercury in fish caught near you.   To see a larger version of the graph, click on the graph. 

Each bar in the graph shows the level of mercury in each fish caught by our volunteers. The fish that do not trigger a warning for reducing how many you eat are in YELLOW. Those fish that have mercury levels high enough to limit eating them or feeding them to your family to once a week are above the BLACK bar.  Those that should be limited to no more than one a month are above the RED bar.

What do these results mean?

Every single fish collected had measureable levels of mercury in them.  Some fish, paticularly the largemouth bass & chain pickerel (jack fish), had really high levels.  You should limit eating these fish to no more than one meal/month AND not eat any other fish during that time.  Smaller fish like redbreast, are safer choices for your family. 

The GOOD NEWS is that along Georgia's coast, the near-shore fish, like seatrout had lower levels of mercury.  Let's keep them that way!

Learn more about the health effects of mercury and what you can do to keep mercury out of the rivers and off the dinner table.

View 2009 Ogeechee Fish Collection in a larger map