With no natural predators and expenses of green suburban neighborhoods

With no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods that allow no hunting, wildlife officials estimate the New Jersey deer population to have grown to exceed 175,000.

A. With no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods that allow no hunting, wildlife officials estimate the New Jersey deer population to have What follows the clause “With no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods that allow no hunting” should be who are what is being described in this clause. “Wildlife officials” is not what is being described here. So this option does not work.

B. With no natural predators and with expanses of green suburban neighborhoods that do not allow hunting, wildlife officials' estimate of deer population in New Jersey has “Wildlife officials’ estimates” is not what is being described here. So this option does not work.

C. With no natural predators and with expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting, the deer population in New Jersey, wildlife officials estimate, has The clause is referring to the deer population. So this option works.

D. Without natural predators and no hunting allowed in expanses of green suburban neighborhoods, New Jersey has a deer population that wildlife officials estimate to have “New Jersey” is not what is being described here. So this option does not work.

E. Without natural predators and with expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting, wildlife officials in New Jersey estimate a deer population that has “Wildlife officials” is not what is being described here. So this option does not work.

- Nitha Jay

Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-

Meaning is crucial to solving this problem:
Understanding the intended meaning is key to solving this question; the intended meaning of this sentence is that the deer population in New Jersey has no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting, and wildlife officials estimate that this deer population has grown to exceed 175,000.

Concepts tested here: Meaning + Modifiers + Verb Forms + Parallelism

• In a “phrase + comma + noun” construction, the phrase must correctly modify the noun; this is one of the most frequently tested concepts on GMAT sentence correction.
• The present perfect tense (marked by the use of the helping verb “has/have”) is also used to refer to actions that concluded in the recent past; however, alongside the use of present perfect tense is redundant if the sentence otherwise indicates that the action concluded in the recent past, such as through the use of “recent” or “recently”.
• Any elements linked by a conjunction ("and" in this sentence) must be parallel.

A: This answer choice incorrectly uses "With no natural predators and...no hunting" to modify "wildlife officials", illogically implying that wildlife officials have no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting; the intended meaning is that the deer population in New Jersey has no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting; please remember, in a “phrase + comma + noun” construction, the phrase must correctly modify the noun. Further, Option A incorrectly uses the perfect infinitive verb form ("to + have + past participle" - "to have grown" in this sentence) to refer to an action that concluded in the recent past; please remember, the present perfect tense (marked by the use of the helping verb “has/have”) is used to refer to actions that concluded in the recent past.

B: This answer choice incorrectly uses "With no natural predators and...no hunting" to modify "wildlife officials' estimate", illogically implying that the wildlife officials' estimate of the New Jersey deer population has no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting; the intended meaning is that the deer population in New Jersey, itself, has no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting; please remember, in a “phrase + comma + noun” construction, the phrase must correctly modify the noun.

C: Correct. This answer choice correctly uses "With no natural predators and...no hunting" to modify "the deer population in New Jersey", conveying the intended meaning - that the deer population in New Jersey has no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting. Further, Option C uses the phrase "estimate has grown", conveying the intended meaning that wildlife officials estimate that the deer population in New Jersey has grown to exceed 175,000. Additionally, Option C correctly uses the present perfect tense verb "has grown" to refer to an action that concluded in the recent past. Besides, Option C correctly maintains parallelism between "no natural predators" and "expanses of green suburban neighborhoods".

D: This answer choice incorrectly uses "With no natural predators and...suburban neighborhoods" to modify "New Jersey", illogically implying that New Jersey has no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting; the intended meaning is that the deer population in New Jersey has no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting; please remember, in a “phrase + comma + noun” construction, the phrase must correctly modify the noun. Further, Option D incorrectly uses the perfect infinitive verb form ("to + have + past participle" - "to have grown" in this sentence) to refer to an action that concluded in the recent past; please remember, the present perfect tense (marked by the use of the helping verb “has/have”) is used to refer to actions that concluded in the recent past. Additionally, Option D fails to maintain parallelism between "natural predators" and "no hunting allowed"; please remember, any elements linked by a conjunction ("and" in this sentence) must be parallel.

E: This answer choice incorrectly uses "With no natural predators and...no hunting" to modify "wildlife officials", illogically implying that wildlife officials have no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting; the intended meaning is that the deer population in New Jersey has no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting; please remember, in a “phrase + comma + noun” construction, the phrase must correctly modify the noun. Moreover, Option E further alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase "estimate a deer population that has"; the construction of this phrase leads to an incoherent meaning; the intended meaning is that the wildlife officials estimate that the deer population in New Jersey has grown to exceed 175,000.

Hence, C is the best answer choice.

To understand the concept of "Present Perfect Tense" on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~1 minute):



To understand the concept of "Simple Tenses" on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~1 minute):



All the best!
Experts' Global Team

First question we should ask is - what is the introductory clause modifying?

"With no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods that allow no hunting" - it can't be wildlife officials or the deer population. This clause clearly describes the peculiarities of New Jersey. So new "New jersey" should immediately follow the clause - and so it does in (D).

Based solely on that fact we already can choose the correct answer.

And for further analysis, it's worth mentioning that "without" seems better than "with no" - therefore (A), (B) and (C) should be considered too wordy and be out

humm , good question

First thing - population is singular so , has should be used - A , D out

Between B , C and E B and C are modifying wildlife officials and C is modifying deer
Obviously deer is correct . Predators can not modify wildlife officials

I go for C.
This problem is a very good example of ellipsis, as explained by Kaplan. Firstly, the negation is used wrongly. It should be "....no and no..." or "...no or ....". In this sentence the negation is applied to natural predators and to expanses of green suburban neighbourhoods, which is not the intended meaning.
Secondly, parallelism calls for the use of "with" on both sides of the parallel marker. Thirdly, "deer population" is a singular subject and requires a singular verb such as "has".
Lastly, the plural possessive noun (s') is almost always wrong on the GMAT.

The clue hers is to know what or which or who dose not have natural predators. Wildlife officials can not have predators, so dump A, B and E. New Jersey, a place also can not have predators. So drop D. What is left is C, indicating logically that the deer population has no natural predators and that is the obvious choice

Answer (C) is not a case of the double negative. Each ‘no’ occurs in different dependent clauses. The first ‘no’ relates to the absence of natural predators and the second ‘no’ relates to the absence of hunting.

As for the explanation, daagh does a very succinct job of explaining the modifier problem.

There is a subject verb agreement issue at the end of the sentence. the population is singular so we need has - this eliminates A and D. B, C and D all have the same type of modifier so the way the begining is worded is not at issue adn teh different between without and with no is an issue of style, not grammar. B says that the officials estimate as grown, not the deer population so it changes the meaning and is wrong. In E the begining phrase modifies wildlife officials, not the deer population so E is wrong and C is hte best answer.

"without natural preditors" is a modifier and as written, it modifies New Jersey, which is incorrect.

In C deer can have green expanses where hunting is not allowed therefore this is an appropriate modifier

D seems to suggest that New Jersey does not have natural predators; the intent is to convey that the deer population does not have natural predators. Also, D does not seem to be very clear in meaning:

Without natural predators and (without) no hunting allowed in expanse of green suburban neighborhoods?

A better construct would have been:

Without natural predators and with no hunting allowed in expanse of green suburban neighborhoods... (though problem mentioned above about New Jersey would still have remained).

By the way, If C was:

With no natural predators and with expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting, wildlife officials estimate that the deer population in New Jersey has grown to exceed 175,000

Again this would have suggested that wildlife officials have no natural predators : )

Hi Deepak,

Thanks for posting your question here

Meaning is the key to solve this one.

According to wildlife official estimate, deer population in New Jersey has grown to exceed 175,000/ What is the reason for this growth? There are two reasons mentioned in the sentence.
1. Deer in New Jersey have no natural predators.
2. Deer have expanses of green suburban neighborhood where hunting is not allowed.
Both these factors account for increase in the number of deer in New Jersey.

However, the opening modifiers in all the answer choices, except for Choice D, refer to the incorrect entity.

Now let's come to Choice C the construction of which has confused you:

Choice C: With no natural predators and with expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting, the deer population in New Jersey, wildlife officials estimate, has

One way to understand this structure is to understand the role of this clause "wildlife official estimate". What is it that they have estimated? They have estimated the deer population in New Jersey. So in essence, "wildlife official estimate" acts as a noun modifier that refers to "the deer population in New Jersey".

Look at the following example:
I will have the pizza I usually order.

This sentence may also appear to be having two independent clauses. But that is not the case. The clause "I usually order" actually modifies "the pizza". The sentence can be written as:
I will have the pizza that I usually order.

Something similar is happening in Choice C of this official question. So the clause "wildlife officials estimate" is not an independent clause but a dependent clause and hence does not lead to fragment error.

Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha

With no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods that allow no hunting, wildlife officials estimate the New Jersey deer population to have grown to exceed 175,000


There is no need to kneejerk on this simple question that is deceptively daunting. Just look at the modification alone. The introductory modifier should modify its most logical noun, namely 'the deer population'. cool enough?

A. With no natural predators and expanses of green suburban neighborhoods that allow no hunting, wildlife officials estimate the New Jersey deer population to have -- It is wrong to ascribe wildlife officials to the modified noun. How can wildlife official be with or without natural predators or greenery?
B. With no natural predators and with expanses of green suburban neighborhoods that do not allow hunting, wildlife officials' estimate of the deer population in New Jersey has -- The same problem as in A.

C. With no natural predators and with expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting, the deer population in New Jersey, wildlife officials estimate, has -- The correct modified noun and the correct choice.
D. Without natural predators and no hunting allowed in expanse of green suburban neighborhoods, New Jersey has a deer population that wildlife officials estimate to have-- New Jersey is a wrong modified noun as in A and B.

E. Without natural predators and with expanses of green neighborhoods where there is no hunting, wildlife officials in New Jersey estimate a deer population that has -- The same problem. as in all other incorrect choices.


Thus, in one stroke you are at Rome.

It may be also noted that 'to have ' is not a verb; it is as an infinitive. Hence, it does not feature sub-verb element. 'have' is the base form of the verb. You will never see 'to has' in English

If you do not only take sentence structure into account, they are all wrong. The fact is though that only C has the correct sentence structure. In all the other answers the "with no natural predators" could refer to "the wildlife officials" or in the case of D "New Jersey".

A. Officials could be prey.
B. Officials could be prey.
C. Right sentence structure and coherence.
D. Jersey could be prey.
E. Officials could be prey.

Why is C wrong? It changes the meaning. No hunting allowed does not imply that there is no hunting. One can suggest the other, but that is making your own assumptions, which you should always avoid on GMAT.

The question should be tossed.

For C it seems like " and with expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting" is referring to the Deer Population. Is there a specific rule for this because all of the answers seem wrong here to me as I don't see how that makes sense.

Marger , I do not understand exactly what you are asking.

You write that with expanses of green suburban neighborhoods where there is no hunting "seems" as if it is referring to the deer population.
That phrase indeed refers to the deer population.

What do you mean by "this" in "Is there a specific rule for this?" This what?
I wrote a post about introductory phrases that begin with prepositions here.
In that instance the preposition was in. In this instance the preposition is with.
That post contains guidelines. Introductory prepositional phrases differ from five other kinds of introductory phrases.
Stricter rules govern the latter.

And what part, logically, does not "make sense"?

In this statement, both prepositional phrases (with + phrase) modify the subject of the sentence.

Both of the with phrases give us information that helps to unravel the meaning of the sentence.

• Meaning: The deer population in New Jersey does not contend with forces such as natural predators or hunters in hunting areas that might curb the deer population's growth, and officials estimate that the population has grown to exceed 175,000.

• WITH + phrase is a prepositional modifier

The target noun deer population in New Jersey is preceded by its prepositional descriptors (the "with" statements).

What is true of the deer population in New Jersey?
-- The deer population in New Jersey has no natural predators that would curb deer population growth.
-- The deer population in New Jersey has expanses of suburban neighborhoods in which to roam. Hunting is not allowed
in those neighborhoods, hunting that also would curb deer population growth.
-- Without curbs, the deer population has grown. Officials estimate . . .

• WITH?

Oxford Online U.S. Dictionary, here, defines with as possessing (something) as a feature or accompaniment.

Cambridge Online Dictionary, here, defines with as having or possessing (someone or something).

In this official question, here, just as is the case in this question, an introductory phrase headed by the preposition with modifies a sensible noun.

The deer population in New Jersey has no curbs on its growth; the population has no natural predators and has roaming areas in which hunting is not allowed.

-- Awkward rewrite: Wildlife officials estimate that the deer population in New Jersey, with no natural predators [that might curb population growth] and with habitats in which to roam where no hunting is allowed [hunting that might curb population growth], has grown to exceed 175,000.
-- The with-clauses are up front to avoid splitting two different subjects: wildlife officials (estimate that . . . ) and the deer population (which has grown . . .).

Sometimes "with" modification is easier to understand if the with phrase follows the subject.

Example from Oxford dictionary cited above:
After all, people with money and status employ other people to clean up after them.
After all, people who have money and status employ other people to clean up after them.

In the official question cited above, the first part of the sentence, not underlined, is:
With its plan to develop seven and a half acres of shore land, Cleveland is but one of a large number of communities . . .
Cleveland has a plan to develop seven and a half acres of shore land . . . .

• No other subject makes sense
Whose population is growing?
What noun has no natural predators in New Jersey?

Wildlife officials, as in options A, B, and E?
No.

New Jersey, as in option D?
No.

The deer population in New Jersey has no natural predators (and has areas in which to roam where hunting is not allowed).
The deer population has grown because it has no or few curbs on its growth.

Hope that explanation helps.

Dear Expert,

I'm confused by many responses to this question.

First of all, some have said D has wrong S + V agreement, they seem to say that the correct answer has to have "HAS" instead of "HAVE"

"Without natural predators and no hunting allowed in expanses of green suburban neighborhoods, New Jersey has a deer population that wildlife officials estimate to have grown to exceed 50,000"

I think "to have grown" is perfectly fine, and "to HAS GROWN" is absolutely wrong.
Why are some people saying it has to be the latter? Please clarify!

Second of all, for C, I have a hard time wrapping my head around "the deer population, with expanses of green suburban neighborhoods, has grown to exceed" since I think only a LOCATION, like New Jersey, can have expanses of green suburban neighborhood. Like New York has many streets, or "Colorado, with lots of mountains."
How can a population (deer population to be specific), which is an abstract concept, to have a physical expanses of green neighborhood?

Is there any parallel example to this?

I also think that "without natural predators" can modify New Jersey. Some areas in the world have many predators, like lions or tigers, while there are other parts of the world like in New Zealand, there were mostly birds and no predators.

If we argue that "predators" can only be a predator in respect to another animal, then it should be the deer in New Jersey, not deer population. When you think of population, you think of a number.

For those reason, I think C is not the correct answer and D seems better to me. Thanks!

I think it's fair to say that an animal or animal population can have green expanses in which to roam, but I see your point about the possibility of a location not having predators, so let's find another problem with (D).

Typically, when we write "without x and y," we're talking about two elements that are missing. For example, "Tim, utterly without wit and charm, is often the butt of the joke at cocktail parties." Tim lacks two qualities: wit and charm. Makes sense.

But now look at (D): "Without natural predators and no hunting..." So, the two elements lacking are "natural predators" and "no hunting?" It makes no sense to write that something is "without no hunting," so now there's a clear logical error in (D). We might not love (C), but "neighborhoods where there is no hunting" is far clearer and more logical than "without no hunting," so that's what we're left with. (C) is our answer.

Takeaway: you don't have to love every element of the correct answer. Often, you won't. It's far better to look for why the four other options are inferior, and then select the best, or least bad, of the bunch.

I hope that helps!