Not safe for swimming
Is it safe to swim here?
North Carolina · waterway · Blackwater basin
Otterdam Swamp: what state assessments show
Not safe for swimming. Fish here are under a consumption advisory.
Official state determinations under the Clean Water Act — about the waterway, not measurements taken today.
Otterdam Swamp in the Blackwater basin is tracked by the state as 2 separately assessed stretches (most recent cycle: 2022). Below is every designated-use determination on record — and what hasn't been assessed.
Designated uses
Fish here are under a consumption advisory
Can I eat fish caught here?
Supports healthy aquatic life
Can fish and aquatic insects live here?
A use the state didn't report is omitted rather than shown as passing. "Never assessed" means unknown — never clean.
Listed causes
- escherichia coli (e. coli) (pathogens)
- mercury in fish tissue (mercury)
A listed cause names what the assessment found in the water. It is not an attribution to any specific facility or source.
Assessed stretches
The state tracks this waterway as 2 assessment units — a stretch can fail a standard while another meets it.
Assessment unit IDs (2)
VAP-K32R_OTR01A98 · VAP-K32R_OTR02A00
What the record doesn’t establish
- What today's water looks like — assessments are determinations made on multi-year cycles, not live measurements.
Common questions
Is it safe to swim in Otterdam Swamp?
The state has determined Otterdam Swamp is not considered safe for swimming. That is an official Clean Water Act determination about the waterway, not a measurement taken today.
Can you eat fish caught in Otterdam Swamp?
The state has determined fish caught in Otterdam Swamp are under a consumption advisory — it doesn't meet standards for eating the fish caught in it.
Why is Otterdam Swamp listed as impaired?
State assessments list: escherichia coli (e. coli), mercury in fish tissue. A listed cause names the problem the assessment found — it does not attribute it to any specific source.
Sources
| Dataset | Agency version | Retrieved |
|---|---|---|
| EPA/state ATTAINS waterway assessments | ATTAINS_Assessment ArcGIS snapshot (gispub.epa.gov) | 2026-08-15 |
| ATTAINS waterway geometry | ATTAINS_Assessment ArcGIS lines + areas (gispub.epa.gov) | 2026-08-16 |
| USGS watershed boundaries | USGS WBD via National Map MapServer | 2026-08-15 |
Records lag their agencies' refresh cycles — a recent change may not appear yet. Absence from a dataset is absence of a record, never evidence that water is clean.
Also in the Blackwater basin
Go deeper
Search an address near Otterdam Swamp to see how it connects — what drains toward it, monitoring-station samples, and permitted operations in its watershed.
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