“Groundwater is incredibly fluid in its movement, and even if you protect some areas, it still has the possibility to spread,” Annie D’Amato, a Beyond Pesticides legal and policy associate, said in an email.

Reeves said her family has decided not to apply for help from the Department of Natural Resources’ well compensation program for that very reason.

“They want us to put in a new well with no guarantees that when we dig it, we're not going to be poisoned anyway,” she said. “I would probably put in a new well if they would guarantee me that the well would be clean.”

Reeves said the good news is that the family has installed new filters that do take out the contaminants. “But I ask myself: How many other poisons will turn up next?"

Atrazine falls, other herbicides spike

A similar question is posed in another portion of Ory’s research. She found that in Wisconsin, decreased atrazine use has been accompanied by a large increase in use of other herbicides on corn fields, including glyphosate, whose health effects are unclear.