About

The Fish Doorbell is a device controlled by viewers of a livestream at visdeurbel.nl that allows fish to pass through a sluice gate at the press of a button, which alerts the gate operator of the presence of fish. The fish doorbell, located in Utrecht, Netherlands, has been implemented every year since 2021 roughly between March and June as a way of helping the fish with seasonal migration, keeping them safe from predators and acting as an alternative to a fish ladder.

History

The fish doorbell. run in collaboration between the Municipality of Utrecht, Waterboard De Stichtse Rijnlanden and Water Authority Amstel, Gooi and Vecht, first started streaming on visdeurbel.nl^[1] on March 29th, 2021.^[2] It ran between March and June of that year during the fish's spring migration upstream.

That year, the visdeurbel Instagram^[3] page began uploading videos and images of fish seen on the stream (examples shown below). The fish doorbell stream is reinstated every year between March and June.

2022

On June 14th, 2022, YouTuber^[8] 86Leinad posted a roughly 40-minute video of footage taken from a 2022 fish doorbell stream, day, garnering over 40,000 views in two years (shown below).

2024

In 2024, the fish doorbell became significantly popular online as people made memes and posts about it on social media, also sharing images and videos of the fish they saw at the door. On March 8th, 2024, Tumblr^[4] user pezcautism made a post about the fish doorbell, sharing several images of fish at the door and writing about how "obsessed" they are with the stream, garnering over 59,000 notes in a month (shown below).

The post went viral and was reposted to /r//CuratedTumblr^[5] on March 17th, garnering over 5,300 upvotes in a month. On March 18th, X^[6] user @quirkathon reposted it, garnering over 34,000 likes in the same span of time. On March 20th, it was posted to /r/CuratedTumblr^[7] again, garnering over 3,100 upvotes in three weeks.

On March 19th, TikToker^[9] @stephanieresists posted a meme about the fish doorbell that gained over 900,000 views in a month (shown below, left). On March 21st, TikToker^[10] @thunder_keck posted a video about the doorbell that gained over 3.5 million views in three weeks (shown below, right).

Online Presence

The fish doorbell livestream is available to watch at visdeurbel.nl. The stream has an official YouTube^[11] channel @DutchWallFish, which gives updates on the stream and educates viewers on various topics related to it (example shown below). The stream is also available on the Visdeurbel Utrecht YouTube^[12] channel.

Search Interest

External References