Guide
Beach water: who samples, and what an advisory means
Checked September 29, 2026 against the Louisiana Department of Health’s beach advisory map layer.
The beach tile shows what the Louisiana Department of Health (LDH) publishes for the beaches its Beach Monitoring Program samples: whether a swimming advisory is up, the latest Enterococcus count, the 30-day geometric mean and the day the sample was taken. This page says how the tile reads that, and what it cannot tell you.
Where LDH has an advisory up, stay out of the water. The tile prints LDH’s own word, Advisory, and LDH’s own reason.
After heavy rain, wait. Runoff reaches the water in hours, and the last sample was taken before it.
What the tile shows
The tile reads LDH’s own map layer of beach advisories, one row for each sampling station: the beach, its status (ADVISORY or NO ADVISORY), the reason for an advisory, the Enterococcus count per 100 ml, the 30-day geometric mean and the sample date.
- A beach is its stations. LDH samples Holly Beach at six stations, Grand Isle Beach at three and Grand Isle State Park at four. The tile shows each beach at its worst station and says how many it has.
- The words are LDH’s. A status the tile does not recognise shows as Check, never as clear. A beach missing from LDH’s layer shows “No sample listed”.
- Each beach is filed under the nearest board town.
On September 29, 2026 LDH had advisories up at Lake Charles North Beach, Cypremort Point State Park Beach and Fontainebleau State Park Beach, all three for the 30-day geometric mean.
Every beach on the southwest board
| Beach | Nearest board town, parish | Sampled |
|---|---|---|
| Martin Beach | Holly Beach, Cameron | Yes |
| Long Beach | Holly Beach, Cameron | Yes |
| Little Florida Beach | Holly Beach, Cameron | Yes |
| Gulf Breeze Beach | Holly Beach, Cameron | Yes |
| Constance Beach | Holly Beach, Cameron | Yes |
| Holly Beach | Holly Beach, Cameron (6 stations) | Yes |
| Rutherford Beach | Grand Chenier, Cameron | Yes |
| Lake Charles North Beach | Lake Charles, Calcasieu | Yes |
| Cypremort Point State Park Beach | Cypremort Point, St. Mary | Yes |
Every beach on the bayou board
| Beach | Nearest board town, parish | Sampled |
|---|---|---|
| Elmer’s Island | Grand Isle, Jefferson | Yes |
| Grand Isle Beach | Grand Isle, Jefferson (3 stations) | Yes |
| Grand Isle State Park Beach | Grand Isle, Jefferson (4 stations) | Yes |
Every beach on the southeast board
| Beach | Nearest board town, parish | Sampled |
|---|---|---|
| Fontainebleau State Park Beach | Mandeville, St. Tammany | Yes |
Parishes where nobody samples a beach
Vermilion, Terrebonne, Lafourche, Plaquemines, St. Bernard and Orleans parishes have no station on LDH’s layer, and the tile on those towns’ pages says so and shows the nearest beach that is sampled. A beach nobody samples is not a clean beach. It is a beach with no result.
Sources
- Louisiana Department of Health, beach advisory map layer (BEACH_ADVISORY_STATUS) — the station rows the tile reads: beach, status, advisory reason, Enterococcus count, 30-day geometric mean and sample date
- Louisiana Department of Health, Louisiana Beach Monitoring Program — the program’s own map and story