Manganese and nitrate are worth checking in Madison County wells.
2 worth checking, 4 rare out of 6 health checks.
From 11 wells tested in Madison County since 2000; your own well needs its own test. How to read this
Rare: under 5%Worth checking: 5 to 15%Widespread: 15%+
Lab results: Water Quality Portal (USGS and EPA)
Who drinks from a well here
About 1 in 19 people 20,690 people
Nobody else tests these wells. Only you do.
People on wells: EPA researchers' 2020 estimate
Radon risk (a gas from rock)
Likely here. Test your home's air first.
Radon zones: EPA map
Here's how Madison County compares with Alabama and the counties around it.
Each result puts Madison County next to the 6 counties that border it, on the chart's 0 to 50% scale.
These 2 are worth checking in Madison County.
Manganese1 of 11 wells over
Nitrate1 of 11 wells over
These 4 are rare in Madison County.
Lead0 of 11 wells over
Arsenic0 of 11 wells over
Uranium0 of 11 wells over
Fluoride0 of 11 wells over
Every well needs a bacteria test every year.
E. coli0 of 9 wells had it
E. coli means human or animal waste is getting in, so if a test of your Madison County well finds it, boil drinking water until the well is fixed.
Iron reached staining levels in 3 of 11 tested wells, and it isn't a health risk.
Iron stains3 of 11 wells had it
About 9 in 10 of the 11 wells tested in Madison County have a test from 2020 or later.
With 10 wells tested since 2020, age matters less here than who did the testing and why.
Most Madison County wells in these records were tested for research or because someone suspected a problem, which can push the shares above what a typical home well would show (how we read the numbers).
One mail-in lab test covers the 4 things to check in Madison County.
- Bacteria
- Nitrate
- Manganese
- Arsenic
What Alabama offers well owners
- Free testingWe didn't find a free program for all of Alabama. Alabama's private well page
- Certified labsAlabama's list of certified labs
- Well recordsWe didn't find an online search.
Here's what we know about radon and PFAS in Madison County.
Madison County is in the EPA's highest radon zone. Radon from well water adds to the radon in your indoor air, so test your air first, and your water too if the air is high. Radon guide
Between 2023 and 2025 the EPA had 8 town water systems in Madison County test for PFAS. 3 of them had at least one test above 4 ng/L, the new EPA limit for PFOA and PFOS. The highest single result was 9.0 ng/L of PFOS. No well in Madison County has public PFAS results, so the town systems are the best clue to what's in the groundwater nearby. PFAS guide
Radon zones: EPA Map of Radon Zones. PFAS: EPA tests of town water systems, 2023 to 2025
Questions people ask about well water in Madison County
Is well water in Madison County safe to drink?
1 of 11 wells tested in Madison County had nitrate over the limit, about 1 in 11. Across Alabama it's about 1 in 27. That's a bigger share than in 4 of the 5 other Alabama counties with 10 or more tested wells. So test your own well for nitrate before you count on it.
Where can I get my well tested in Madison County?
Use a lab Alabama has certified for drinking water. Alabama's list is linked above, in the box about testing. Ask for bacteria, nitrate, manganese and arsenic, the tests that matter most in Madison County.
How often should I test my well in Madison County?
Madison County has no public bacteria results for wells, so follow the CDC's advice: test for bacteria and nitrate every year, and right away after a flood, a repair, or any change in taste or smell.
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Where the Madison County numbers come from
- People on wells: 20,690 in Madison County, from EPA estimates built on the 2020 Census (Murray et al.).
- Lab tests: 304 well water samples from 11 wells in the Water Quality Portal, run by the USGS and EPA, 2000 to 2022.
- Neighboring counties: the 6 counties that share a border with Madison County, from the Census Bureau's county adjacency file.
- PFAS: EPA tests of 8 town water systems in Madison County under the Fifth Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule, 2023 to 2025.
- Radon: Madison County is zone 1 on the EPA Map of Radon Zones.
- State programs and links: Department of Public Health (county health departments); labs certified by Department of Environmental Management, checked November 1, 2026.