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Twice a year, northern elephant seals

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Twice a year, northern elephant seals

by rakeshd347 » Thu Oct 10, 2013 10:58 pm
Twice a year, northern elephant seals swim to migrate from Southern California to the North Pacific, some of which regularly dive to depths of over 1,000 feet in search of food.

A) swim to migrate from Southern California to the North Pacific, some of which
B) migrate, swimming from Southern California to the North Pacific; some of whom
C) migrate from Southern California to the North Pacific by swimming, some of whom
D) swim to migrate from Southern California to the North Pacific, and some of them
E) migrate, swimming from Southern California to the North Pacific, and some of them

OA soon.
Source: Kaplan test
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by theCodeToGMAT » Thu Oct 10, 2013 11:19 pm
Is it [spoiler]{E}[/spoiler]?
Last edited by theCodeToGMAT on Fri Oct 11, 2013 3:40 am, edited 1 time in total.
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by gmatclubmember » Fri Oct 11, 2013 1:06 am
Is the OA C
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by neptune28 » Fri Oct 11, 2013 1:18 am
The answer seems to be [spoiler]E)[/spoiler]. Why?

1) Well, what is the important thing that these seals do twice a year? Swim? No, they do that more than twice a year. ;)

2) So, how exactly do seals migrate? By swimming from place X to place Y. This is parenthetical information that should be enclosed in commas.

3) OK, are seals humans or animals? That tells us whether "whom" is appropriate.

That all pretty much narrows the choices down. :mrgreen: One more thing--the semicolon in B) is inappropriate because the sentence has only one independent clause.

Hope this helps! :)
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by vinay1983 » Fri Oct 11, 2013 3:03 am
I think here we need "migrate" after "seals" since it modifies the the phrase before it. The seals migrate twice a year, how?by swimming?where?from X to Y

I will go with E

swim though seems apparent but is incorrect here.
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by [email protected] » Fri Oct 11, 2013 1:38 pm
Hi All,

It looks like you've caught the important grammar details of this SC. There's one more that didn't come up in any of the posts though:

Since the seals migrate twice a year (each year), the proper verb can't be restricted to past, present or future - it has to be a timeless verb (a verb ending in -ing). The verb "swimming" is perfect for this type of sentence.

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by rakeshd347 » Fri Oct 11, 2013 4:08 pm
OA is indeed E
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by sanjoy18 » Fri Oct 11, 2013 10:54 pm
What is wrong with D, expert Please reply
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by [email protected] » Sat Oct 12, 2013 1:59 pm
Hi sanjoy18,

With answer D, the opening sentence would be "Twice a year, northern elephant seals SWIM....". This answer doesn't match the INTENT of the sentence - this wording makes it sound like the seals SWIM twice a year. Twice a year, seals MIGRATE - THAT is the intent. By making this observation, you can eliminate A and D.

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by Mission2012 » Sun Oct 13, 2013 5:53 am
Rich,

I am really stumped when the intended meaning of the sentence is incorrect in option A.
GMAT doesn't expect the test takers to bring in any information about elephant seals.
Say i replace "elephant seals" by "abcdxyz" - an animal that swim only twice a year to migrate.
Now in such cases, from which option would you interpret the right meaning of the sentence.

This has often bothered me.

What is you telisman on this.

Regards,

[email protected] wrote:Hi sanjoy18,

With answer D, the opening sentence would be "Twice a year, northern elephant seals SWIM....". This answer doesn't match the INTENT of the sentence - this wording makes it sound like the seals SWIM twice a year. Twice a year, seals MIGRATE - THAT is the intent. By making this observation, you can eliminate A and D.

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by [email protected] » Sun Oct 13, 2013 4:09 pm
Hi Mission2012,

You bring up an interesting point: the idea that you might not "know" what a "seal" is, so maybe it migrates twice a year OR maybe it swims twice a year. Whoever wrote this Kaplan question DID provide a bit of a hint about the intent though (when he/she mentioned that the seal dives over 1,000 feet to find food). To make your argument, you'd have to make the claim that MAYBE seals only swim twice a year AND dive for food only twice a year (since diving is swimming). This is a weak argument.

Actual GMAT questions provide the necessary clues/information for you to make these decisions correctly and eliminate any debate about the correct answer, so you don't need to be overly concerned about this happening on Test Day.

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