Reticulated pythons number among a thousand or so species of the world

C and D are disaster because of they way they use "which".
A though grammatically correct, illogically implies that the females and infants we are talking about belong to those pythons. I just assume that we are concerned of the females that belong to humans. aren't we?
E is a close contender. But if you look closely, you will notice that since "living" is an ing form of the verb preceded by a comma. Hence it modifies the entire preceding clause.
For your comfort, I am restating it. Reticulated pythons number among a thousand or so species of the world's poisonous snakes, living in a community bla bla. Just ask yourself, whether "living in a community...." is a consequence of the preceding clause.
Also, the items of the list should be parallel. "consists" doesn't seems parallel to rest of the items.
B is clear and correct.
Hope that helps.

(A) snakes living in a highly scattered and unorganized community where they consist mostly of: Incorrect. "they" is ambiguous as it can refer to snakes or pythons.
(B) snakes that live in a highly scattered and unorganized community consisting mostly of: Correct. Removes the ambiguity of A and has parallel list of scattered and unorganized.
(C) which means they live in a highly scattered and unorganized community, mostly of: Incorrect. "Which means" distort the meaning and makes the sentence long.
(D) which means that their community is highly scattered, unorganized, and it is consisting mostly of: Incorrect for the same reason as C.
(E) living in a community that is highly scattered, unorganized, and it consists mostly of: Incorrect. Parallelism error - "it consist mostly of" is not parallel to "scattered" and "unorganized".

Reticulated pythons number among a thousand or so species of the world's poisonous snakes, snakes living in a highly scattered and unorganized community where they consist mostly of females and infants.

(A) snakes living in a highly scattered and unorganized community where they consist mostly of---- where is used for places , for community "IN WHICH"
(B) snakes that live in a highly scattered and unorganized community consisting mostly of
(C) which means they live in a highly scattered and unorganized community, mostly of====== which refer to snakes , meaning less sentence
(D) which means that their community is highly scattered, unorganized, and it is consisting mostly of===== same as C
(E) living in a community that is highly scattered, unorganized, and it consists mostly of----- IT is redundant and is not in \\ structure.


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Hii Vineet.
IMO "they" IS referring to snakes, not CAN.

B is clearly correct, so we can simply stop reading right there.

Or a 2-second glance would reveal the clear error in each of the other options!

Similar Question to practise will be -

since-the-1930s-aircraft-manufacturers-have-tried-to-build-71360.html
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Isnt the sentence a run on error, .... snakes, snakes.... a comma connecting two independent clause?
isnt it that way B can be looked for some error scope?


e-gmat , sovvik, magoosh experts.. please reply.
Thanks

Even I think that B has two independent clauses joined by comma only.
chetan2u
souvik101990

No there is only one main clause:
Reticulated pythons number among a thousand or so species of the world's poisonous snakes. ( subject : pythons, verb: number)

The next portion "snakes that live in a highly scattered and unorganized community consisting mostly of females and infants." is not an independent clause. It is called an absolute phrase modifier. An absolute phrase modifier consists of the structure noun + a noun modifier and modifies the preceding clause as a whole. Example (from Manhattan SC guide):

Scientists have found high levels of iridium in certain geological formations around the world, results that suggest the cataclysmic impact of a meteor millions of years ago.

Absolute phrase is the underlined portion above, which consists of a noun ("results") and a relative clause modifier of "results" ("that suggest the cataclysmic impact.....")

Similarly in the above example of absolute phrase:

Noun = Snakes
Modifier = that live in a highly scattered and unorganized ....

(please also note that this part is not an independent clause since there is no main verb for the subject "snakes" - the verb "live" is within the relative clause "that live in...." and its subject is the relative pronoun "that". The main subject "snake" stands alone without any verb - this is a characteristic of an absolute phrase.)

Hi,

Please explain why Option E is Incorrect and how is option b correct.

Thanks.

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