Rats that received cadmium 300 ppm in drinking water (average daily cadmium intake = 4.5 mg/rat) for 12 wk attained peak cadmium levels of 112, 34, and 19 μg/g in hair, liver, and kidney, respectively, at week 4. Rats that ingested cadmium 200 ppm (average daily cadmium intake = 3.6 mg/rat) for 13 wk attained peak cadmium levels of 29 μg/g in kidney at week 7, and 94 and 27 μg/g in hair and liver, respectively, at week 9. Despite continuous exposure to the heavy metal, tissue cadmium concentrations declined to steady‐state levels of 24–33 μg/g in hair and 10–17 μg/g in liver and kidney. Histopathologic effects were not observed in liver or kidney. In contrast to cadmium in hair, blood cadmium levels, which remained consistently low (< 0.04 μg/ml) throughout the study, did not correlate with changes in cadmium levels in liver and kidney.