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About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy

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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  10 Mar 2019, 19:59
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Quote:
Correct answer B inserted into the sentence:

About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia, with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering rangeland worthless.

NinetyFour wrote:
I have a question regarding the "milky sap" modifier here. In answer choice A, it seems like the milky sap is the one that causes mouth sores, but in answer choice B, the meaning changes and it is now the plant that causes the mouth sores. Because of this meaning choice I selected A, could someone briefly go over why my thought process was incorrect?

Hi NinetyFour , LordStark gave you an excellent head start.*

Posts on the thread deal with your question.

Are there parts of those posts that you do not understand?

Essential modifiers can never be removed from a sentence.

Non-essential modifiers can be removed from a sentence.

with milky sap is a non-essential modifier
(1) the phrase is set off by commas, and ONLY non-essential modifiers can be set off by commas.

(2) non-essential modifiers can be removed without changing the core meaning of the sentence

(3) remove the phrase. No kidding.
Take it and the commas out.
"With milky sap" is a prepositional phrase that adds some information.
It is set off by commas. If a modifier is set off by commas, it should be fair game for removal.**

We can also remove the other modifier set off by commas, a . . . plant from Eurasia.

About 5 million acres ... have been invaded by leafy spurge, a ... plant from Eurasia , with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering rangeland worthless.

Now we have

... leafy splurge ... that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering rangeland worthless.

The guideline is: that-clauses almost always touch the noun that they modify. That guideline is not a hard-and-fast rule, as this official question demonstrates.

Sometimes a descriptive phrase such as "with milky sap" cannot be placed in another part of the sentence. In such cases, it is okay for there to be separation between the noun plant, and its relative pronoun that.

Takeaway: is the information set off by commas?
The commas signal that the modifier is not essential.
Remove the information and the comma(s). See what happens.

In this case, what happens is that the leafy splurge gives mouth sores and displaces grasses.

Hope that analysis helps.


*I think that LordStark was hinting that "with milky sap" does not matter a whole lot to the meaning of the sentence. That hint is correct.

**There are a few exceptions to the comma rule such as dates, which must always be set off by commas. Not to worry. GMAC does not test whether information such as a date is essential.
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  10 Mar 2019, 20:23
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Hi generis ,
Please let me know whether my analysis is correct.

About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless.


(A) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering
that refers to milky sap suggesting that displacement is caused by milky sap rather by the plant.
How ever we can correctly infer that milky sap gives mouth sores to cattle.

(B) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia, with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering

That correctly refers to leafy surge and suggests that it displaces the grass.

It would not be incorrect to assume that the plant causes the mouth sores in cattle.

For Ex: The sting of a particular mosquito causes malaria.
A particular type of mosquito causes malaria.

I believe both of them are correct.

Hence we have a reason to choose B over A.
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  10 Mar 2019, 21:36
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Manas1212 wrote:
Hi generis ,
Please let me know whether my analysis is correct.

About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless.


(A) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering
that refers to milky sap suggesting that displacement is caused by milky sap rather by the plant.
How ever we can correctly infer that milky sap gives mouth sores to cattle.

(B) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia, with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering

That correctly refers to leafy surge and suggests that it displaces the grass.

It would not be incorrect to assume that the plant causes the mouth sores in cattle.

For Ex: The sting of a particular mosquito causes malaria.
A particular type of mosquito causes malaria.

I believe both of them are correct.

Hence we have a reason to choose B over A.

Manas1212 , both of your examples are correct.

I think that you are suggesting that we should use logic to figure out
the most likely subject (and causal culprit);
in your examples, the logical culprit is a particular kind of mosquito,
and whether we add the "sting" does not change the causal logic.

In the prompt, the most likely culprit is some hideous plant called "leafy splurge."
What invaded the U.S.? Leafy splurge.
What is likely to be the cause of worthless rangeland? Whatever invaded the U.S.

If you are asking a different question or I have missed your point,
tag me again.
Nice work! +1


(And I just caught an error in my answers: I need to use splurge, the plant's name, not plant.
Plant is in the appositive.)
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  02 Apr 2019, 00:30
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NinetyFour wrote:
I have a question regarding the "milky sap" modifier here. In answer choice A, it seems like the milky sap is the one that causes mouth sores, but in answer choice B, the meaning changes and it is now the plant that causes the mouth sores. Because of this meaning choice I selected A, could someone briefly go over why my thought process was incorrect?

Sorry, I'm maniacally late to the party here, but I'll throw in my two cents anyway, even though it's probably too late to be useful.

You're certainly right that (B) changes the meaning of the sentence, but this is not a reason to eliminate an answer choice. You can eliminate an answer choice if it creates an illogical meaning, but just “changing” the meaning isn’t necessarily a crime.

In this case, the question-writer doesn't expect us to come in with any prior information about leafy spurge, so the question about whether it's the plant or the sap that causes the sores can't be the deciding factor. We need to look for other, more concrete decision points.

Take another look at (A):

Quote:
…states have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering…

As several smart people have noted, this construction makes it sound as though "displacing grasses" is a consequence of the milky sap giving mouth sores to cattle. How would giving mouth sores to cattle make grass disappear? This makes no sense. And because this modification is illogical, (A) is out.

Takeaway: if one of the answer choices changes the original meaning, but it's better, that's a good thing.

I hope that helps!
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  14 Apr 2019, 12:38
Hi Expert,

Option B -
States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia, with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering

I crossed out this option because I thought a 'that' was required before 'displaces' to have a 'that verb1 AND that verb2' parallelism. Of course in the hindsight I realise by POE , option B seems the 'best' option , but I would really appreciate your response on a 'that AND that'usage here.

Also in general is there any difference in meaning when we say -
1 - that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food
2 - that gives mouth sores to cattle and that displaces grasses and other cattle food

Essentially when do we use 'that AND that' parallelism.
Thanks in advance
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  14 Apr 2019, 16:25
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testprep11 wrote:
Hi Expert,

Option B -
States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia, with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering

I crossed out this option because I thought a 'that' was required before 'displaces' to have a 'that verb1 AND that verb2' parallelism. Of course in the hindsight I realise by POE , option B seems the 'best' option , but I would really appreciate your response on a 'that AND that'usage here.

Also in general is there any difference in meaning when we say -
1 - that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food
2 - that gives mouth sores to cattle and that displaces grasses and other cattle food

Essentially when do we use 'that AND that' parallelism.
Thanks in advance

In this case, the clause beginning with "that" is a relative clause that modifies "a herbaceous plant from Eurasia." This relative clause has a subject, "that," which clearly goes with the verbs "gives" and "displaces," just as the the noun "plant" does in the following clause. The plant gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses.

So, while repeating "that" would not make the sentence clearly incorrect, there is no need to repeat "that."

So, when do we have to repeat "that"? We have to repeat "that" when the meaning that we want to convey would not be effectively conveyed unless "that" were repeated.

Consider the following sentences.

I told John that I had seen a man peering into the windows of the building and that the man had been wearing a blue hat.

I told John that I had seen a man peering into the windows of the building, and the man had been wearing a blue hat.

These two sentences are pretty similar, but mean different things.

The first conveys that I told John two things, that I had seen a man and that the man had been wearing a blue hat.

The second contains only one "that," and so, it conveys that I told John one thing, that I had seen a man, and it conveys that, in addition to my telling John about the man, the man had been wearing a blue hat. Because the second "that" is not included, the sentence does not convey that I told John that the man was wearing a blue hat.

Either version is correct, but they convey different things. So, if you want to convey that I told John two things, you have to use "that" twice.

Overall, it helps to realize that analyzing parallel structures tends to be more about considering logic and effectiveness of expression than about checking to see whether a structure is constructed according to some rule.
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  24 Apr 2019, 00:09
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saurabh9gupta wrote:
GMATNinja... could you please explain the correct sentence or structure in which "Having been" would be correct. I understand it needs to be the first of two actions but i want to see how this same sentence would look like if we were to to use - Having been.

Sorry for my horribly belated reply, saurabh9gupta!

There's a pretty long rant about "having + verb" constructions in this transcript from our old verbal chats. The essence is basically what you suggested above: "having + verb" basically has to indicate the first of two actions.

For example, we could say "Having been angry all morning, Charlie ate a third breakfast and subsequently behaved more reasonably." That's fine, since "having been angry" was an action that Charlie "performed" before he ate his third breakfast.

I don't think there's a ton of value in contorting the original sentence to make "having been" work. But I'll give it a shot with a stripped-down version of the sentence, anyway: "Having been invaded by leafy spurge, about 5 million acres in the United States became unpalatable to cattle." In this version, the 5 million acres were invaded by leafy spurge first, and became unpalatable to cattle later. Fair enough.

I hope this helps a bit!
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  28 Apr 2019, 08:45
I have a doubt in this question.

About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, "a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle", displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless.

Isn't the quoted part a non-essential part of the sentence as it describes something on the spurge. Because if it is,then, the comma before and after the non essential can be erased with the non-essential modifier itself, giving rise to the following statement


About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless.

Where displacing is modifying spurge.

I also a a doubt that the non-essential is more than a phrase because of verb "gives" is present in it

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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  28 Apr 2019, 14:29
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Panoj wrote:
I have a doubt in this question.

About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, "a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle", displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless.

Isn't the quoted part a non-essential part of the sentence as it describes something on the spurge. Because if it is,then, the comma before and after the non essential can be erased with the non-essential modifier itself, giving rise to the following statement

About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless.

Where displacing is modifying spurge.

There are a multiple ways of looking at that situation. One is that, while you can remove the modifier that you quoted, you should leave a comma between "spurge" and "displacing."

A second way to look at it is that "displacing grasses ..." is part of the nonessential modifier, and thus could be removed along with the part that you quoted.

A third is your way, which, to a degree, seems to make sense. However, the truth is that restrictively modifying "leafy spurge" with "displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless" creates an awkward sentence with a not entirely clear meaning.

Are we meant to understand that there are multiple types of leafy spurge and that this one type, the type that is displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless is the one invading?

Probably not.

The version created via the use of choice (B), on the other hand, conveys one clear, logical meaning.

Quote:
I also a a doubt that the non-essential is more than a phrase because of verb "gives" is present in it

The entire quoted portion is a noun phrase that serves as an appositive modifying "leafy spurge."

Within that noun phrase, is the relative clause "that gives mouth sores to cattle," which seems to modify the noun "sap."
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  26 May 2019, 00:53
GMATNinja , egmat, RonPurewal

In case of comma + verb-ing modifier, Verb-ing modifier makes sense with the subject of the preceding clause, and it:
i) Either provides additional information about the preceding clause
ii) Or presents the result of the preceding clause.
I agree that in choice A, 'displacing.. & rendering...' are not the results of preceding clause, but why they can't act as an additional information?
In a sentence "Tom killed the snake, using a stick", 'using a stick' acts as an additional information and makes sense with the subject (Tom killed snake by using a stick)
In same way, why it can't be "that (subject referring to plant) gives mouth sores to cattle by displacing grasses.....and rendering rangeland worthless (by starving the cattle)"
Is it that "that" in above sentence is not referring to plant, but acting as a modifier for plant?

Please help.
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  09 Jun 2019, 05:01
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chetansptl wrote:
GMATNinja , egmat, RonPurewal

In case of comma + verb-ing modifier, Verb-ing modifier makes sense with the subject of the preceding clause, and it:
i) Either provides additional information about the preceding clause
ii) Or presents the result of the preceding clause.
I agree that in choice A, 'displacing.. & rendering...' are not the results of preceding clause, but why they can't act as an additional information?
In a sentence "Tom killed the snake, using a stick", 'using a stick' acts as an additional information and makes sense with the subject (Tom killed snake by using a stick)
In same way, why it can't be "that (subject referring to plant) gives mouth sores to cattle by displacing grasses.....and rendering rangeland worthless (by starving the cattle)"
Is it that "that" in above sentence is not referring to plant, but acting as a modifier for plant?

Please help.

The word "that" is indeed a noun modifier here (modifying "plant"). If it were instead a pronoun, we would have, "... a herbaceous plant a plant gives mouth sores", and obviously that wouldn't work.

Also, the plant doesn't give mouth sores to cattle BY rendering rangeland worthless. Sure, I guess we could come up with some bizarre story for how the loss of value eventually, indirectly causes mouth sores in cattle (the cows lose value, and then lose self-confidence, and then start nervously chewing their own mouths...?). But that would be a serious stretch, and the meaning in (B) is MUCH better.

For more on that, check out this post.
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  26 Oct 2019, 08:25
Question:

"that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering"

I thought there is a parallellism issue with this sentence, ultimately I wanted to see something like "that gives and that displaces"
Doesn't that have to be the case?

I've seen splits either way, is the use of two 'that's' only necessary if the once outside form would be ambigous?

Any help is appreciated!
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  30 Nov 2019, 16:40
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chrtpmdr wrote:
Question:

"that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering"

I thought there is a parallellism issue with this sentence, ultimately I wanted to see something like "that gives and that displaces"
Doesn't that have to be the case?

I've seen splits either way, is the use of two 'that's' only necessary if the once outside form would be ambigous?

Any help is appreciated!

Good question! Your understanding about how parallelism works isn't quite correct. It's true that "and" must connect like forms, but which two forms will be determined by context. Generally, the best place to start is immediately after the word "and."

Think of it this way: when you were evaluating (B), you didn't necessarily know that you were looking for a parallel construction until you came across this phrase: "...and displaces grasses..." Once you notice that the element following "and" is a verb, you'll want to go backwards to locate another verb that can be connected to "displaces."

So then we see "a herbaceous plant from Eurasia... that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses..." The verbs "gives" and "displaces" are grammatically parallel, as they're both performing the same function. So far so good.

Next, you'd ask yourself if the two elements are logically parallel. Does it make sense to say that the "herbaceous plant" 1) gives mouth sores to cattle and 2) displaces grasses? Unfortunately for the cattle and grass, it does make sense, so we have correct parallelism, and you can move on to other elements of the sentence.

Put another way, your job isn't to ask yourself what should be parallel - there are lots of ways a sentence can have parallel elements! - but instead, you want to evaluate what is parallel and then determine whether the construction is logical.

For much more on parallelism and meaning, check out this video.

I hope that helps!
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  29 Jun 2020, 07:26
egmat wrote:
sobby wrote:
In B , it seems like "that" is pointing to Eurasia not milky sap..
If B is correct,can some please justify usage of that here..

Comma + that is worrying me in option B ...

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Hello sobby,

I would be glad to help you resolve your doubt. :)

Let me bring in here the sentence with Choice B:

About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia, with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering rangeland worthless.

In the above-mentioned sentence, it is the phrase with milky sap that has been enclosed between two commas. If we were to remove this phrase from the sentence, we would also remove the comma before with and the comma after sap. Hence, it is not so that the that clause is preceded by a comma.

The placement of the phrase with milky sap between the two commas implies this is just an additional information. The milky white sap does not necessarily give mouth sore to the cattle. It is the plant that does so.

Now let's talk about how that correctly modifies the noun entity a herbaceous plant. There is no issue in that modifying a herbaceous plant because the phrase from Eurasia modifies a herbaceous plant and cannot be placed anywhere else in the sentence. Here we see the case of a noun modifier modifying a slightly far away noun. We have a detailed article named Noun Modifiers can Modify slightly far away noun that deals with this concept. This article can be reviewed in the following link:
https://gmatclub.com/forum/noun-modifiers-can-modify-slightly-far-away-noun-135868.html


Hope this helps. :-)
Thanks.
Shraddha


I'm still confused on this one because of 2 points -
1) that mostly defines/explains the word just before it.
2) also, one cannot use that in commas as it would render that as non-essential modifier.

If I look at the spoiler (Nytimes article) there are no commas there and hence it clearly defines what purpose of that is and hence the correct parallelism
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  29 Jun 2020, 08:56
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shubhampathak1sp wrote:
I'm still confused on this one because of 2 points -
1) that mostly defines/explains the word just before it.

Hi Shubham, that is considerably flexible in terms of what it modifies.

For example, in the following correct answer choice:

Marconi conceived of the radio as a tool for private conversation that could substitute for the telephone; instead, it has become precisely the opposite, a tool for communicating with a large, public audience.

that modifies considerably far-away noun tool. In fact, there are numerous such examples in official questions.

Quote:
2) also, one cannot use that in commas as it would render that as non-essential modifier.

with milky sap is a non-essential modifier. How do we know? Well, because it is delimited by commas on both sides.

So, the core of the sentence (without the non-essential modifier) is:

About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia , with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering rangeland worthless.

So, the core sentence is:

About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering rangeland worthless.

Notice that now, there is no comma before that.

p.s. Our book EducationAisle Sentence Correction Nirvana discusses modifier issues of "that", their application and examples in significant detail. If you or someone is interested, PM me your email-id; I can mail the corresponding section.
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  05 Oct 2020, 14:35
Quote:
About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless.

(A) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering
(B) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia, with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering
(C) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia having milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle and displacing grasses and other cattle food, rendering
(D) States, having been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displaces grasses and other cattle food, and renders
(E) States, having been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia that has milky sap giving mouth sores to cattle and displacing grasses and other cattle food, rendering

Request Expert Reply:
Q1:
Hi honorable experts,
I'm a bit confused with this modification part! I need your help, please.
In Choice B, what does 'rendering' modify, actually? Does it modify
a/ only 'leafy spurge displaces....'
b/ only 'leafy spurge gives....'
c/ both 'leafy spurge gives.... and displaces...' simultaneously?
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  05 Oct 2020, 15:00
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TheUltimateWinner wrote:
Quote:
About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless.

(A) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering
(B) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia, with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering
(C) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia having milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle and displacing grasses and other cattle food, rendering
(D) States, having been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displaces grasses and other cattle food, and renders
(E) States, having been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia that has milky sap giving mouth sores to cattle and displacing grasses and other cattle food, rendering

Request Expert Reply:
Q1:
Hi honorable experts,
I'm a bit confused with this modification part! I need your help, please.
In Choice B, what does 'rendering' modify, actually? Does it modify
a/ only 'leafy spurge displaces....'
b/ only 'leafy spurge gives....'
c/ both 'leafy spurge gives.... and displaces...' simultaneously?

Hello, TheUltimateWinner. To answer your question, you need to consider what, exactly, renders rangeland worthless? Is it the fact that leafy spurge gives mouth sores to cattle? That is a drawback, certainly, but then what about the fact that leafy spurge displaces grasses and other cattle food? That seems just as pernicious. And it is, in fact, this dual effect that the -ing modifier is commenting on in choice (B). That is, because leafy spurge both causes mouth sores in cattle and displaces other cattle food, it is a lose-lose proposition for the cattle once the invasive plant takes hold. Of your three options, c/ it is, then.

I hope that helps.

- Andrew
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  12 Oct 2020, 11:34
AndrewN wrote:
TheUltimateWinner wrote:
Quote:
About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering rangeland worthless.

(A) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displacing grasses and other cattle food and rendering
(B) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia, with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering
(C) States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia having milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle and displacing grasses and other cattle food, rendering
(D) States, having been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia with milky sap that gives mouth sores to cattle, displaces grasses and other cattle food, and renders
(E) States, having been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia that has milky sap giving mouth sores to cattle and displacing grasses and other cattle food, rendering

Request Expert Reply:
Q1:
Hi honorable experts,
I'm a bit confused with this modification part! I need your help, please.
In Choice B, what does 'rendering' modify, actually? Does it modify
a/ only 'leafy spurge displaces....'
b/ only 'leafy spurge gives....'
c/ both 'leafy spurge gives.... and displaces...' simultaneously?

Hello, TheUltimateWinner. To answer your question, you need to consider what, exactly, renders rangeland worthless? Is it the fact that leafy spurge gives mouth sores to cattle? That is a drawback, certainly, but then what about the fact that leafy spurge displaces grasses and other cattle food? That seems just as pernicious. And it is, in fact, this dual effect that the -ing modifier is commenting on in choice (B). That is, because leafy spurge both causes mouth sores in cattle and displaces other cattle food, it is a lose-lose proposition for the cattle once the invasive plant takes hold. Of your three options, c/ it is, then.

I hope that helps.

- Andrew

AndrewN
Thanks for the cordial response.
But, RonPurewal ( HERE is the explanation )and egmat says that adverbial modifier will modify the closest action ('displaces.....' NOT 'gives...'). In my version, it is a/, according to RonPurewal and egmat. I'm getting confused in this sorta things!
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  12 Oct 2020, 15:00
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TheUltimateWinner wrote:
AndrewN
Thanks for the cordial response.
But, RonPurewal ( HERE is the explanation )and egmat says that adverbial modifier will modify the closest action ('displaces.....' NOT 'gives...'). In my version, it is a/, according to RonPurewal and egmat. I'm getting confused in this sorta things!

Hello again, TheUltimateWinner. Apologies for confusing you. I see nothing wrong with an -ing modifier commenting on a dual action, one that is connected by an and. Think of the following sentence:

He studied for three hours a day and used the best materials, [thereby] increasing his chances of earning a desirable score.

It does not make sense to say that the -ing phrase modifies used the best materials exclusively, since studying for three hours a day is marked as a parallel element that might logically also increase one's chances of earning a desirable score. In the sentence at hand, you might make a case that giving mouth sores to cattle has nothing to do directly with making rangeland worthless. I guess it depends on whether you consider cows that cannot eat grass properly a necessary component to the valuation of rangeland. In any case, such a consideration did not guide my hand when it came to choosing an answer.

I hope the above hypothetical sentence demonstrates that an -ing modifier might logically refer back to parallel entities that can collectively be thought of as one.

- Andrew
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink] New post  31 Oct 2020, 18:14
Expert Reply
Hello Anuragsharma93,
Thank you for the PM. :-)

Quote:
Hi Shraddha,

Dont we need two That's here for parallelism ?
About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy spurge, a herbaceous plant from Eurasia, with milky sap, that gives mouth sores to cattle and
THAT displaces grasses and other cattle food, rendering rangeland worthless.




The answer to your question is no. And here is the reason why:


When the parallel clauses have the same subject, then that may not be repeated.

• The dresses that have crystals and (that) belong to the latest collection are on a special promotion for premier customers.



When the parallel clauses have different subject-verb pairs, then that must be repeated.

• The doctor said that sedimentary life is the main source of most of the ailments and that everyone must fit in some exercise regime in his/her daily life.


The correct answer choice of the "leafy spurge" official question has the first structure. Both verbs - gives and displaces - have the same subject "that" (that modifies a herbaceous plant from Eurasia = the leafy spurge). Hence, repeating the subject "that" is optional before the second verb.


Hope this helps. :-)
Thanks.
Shraddha
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Re: About 5 million acres in the United States have been invaded by leafy [#permalink]
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