Not that it ever seems sanitary to eat a fish found on the sidewalk, but this week’s deluge has reportedly pushed a bunch of New Jersey fish out of their pond and stream homes and sent them up through the sewers, and officials are warning residents not to consume them. You know what they say: give a man a fish and you’ll feed him for for a day, but give a man a fish found in a sewer drain and he’ll have diarrhea for a lifetime.

Newark’s Health and Community Wellness Department went so far as to issue an official alert yesterday after news reports showed residents catching fish swimming upstream on a flooded street. Authorities say the fish may have come in contact with bacteria and other contaminants during their journey through the sewer. That ain’t good eatin’. “This is a dangerous practice and residents are urged to refrain from trapping, catching, and eating any fish caught on the streets,” Dr. Hanaa Hamdi, the department’s director, told reporters.

For reference, sewer fish look something like this:

Officials are warning residents not to eat fish that washed ashore during heavy rains: http://t.co/pJTBpiJa4L pic.twitter.com/fSSEswA6mi

— NBC New York (@NBCNewYork) June 2, 2015

We hear Blinky doesn’t taste very good, anyway.

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