We modeled and simulated the interactions of fin rays with vortex dipoles in a 2D fluid. The model was previously used to study the swimming of flexible foils and body-vortex interactions at high Reynolds number (Alben, 2009, 2012; Alben et al., 2012). We refer to these works for technical background on the model. We modeled a bending fin ray as a passive flexible beam in a 2D fluid. We assumed that the fin ray is connected to a body at one end, and rotates freely there (a pinned or hinged boundary). At the other end, the fin ray had a free-end boundary condition. The coordinate system used for the model was adapted to fit the context of the live fish studied (e.g., XY plane in the lateral view of the fish, XZ plane in the ventral view of the fish, and YZ plane in the posterior view of the fish). The fish body was modeled as an infinite straight wall along the xaxis, which fluid does not penetrate, and to which the fin ray was connected at the origin. Due to its infinite extent, the wall is a somewhat stronger barrier than is the fish body, but its main role is to provide a realistic resemblance to the geometry where the fin ray attaches to the body. In each of our simulations, a vortex dipole was initialized at a finite distance from the fin ray. Subsequent to the initial time, the motion of the dipole and the fin ray was found by solving the equations of 2D fluid dynamics (the incompressible Euler equations with slip boundary conditions on the fin ray and wall) together with the equation for the dynamics of a bending beam (Alben, 2009). Each vortex in the dipole pair is a smoothed blob, with a parameter d 5 0.1, giving the typical spread radius, and corresponding to the vortex rings’ radii in our experiments. The functional form of the blob is that given by Krasny (1986