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Holstein Cows

by f2001290 » Sat Jun 16, 2007 5:57 am
For the farmer who takes care to keep them cool, providing them with high-energy feed,
and milking them regularly, Holstein cows are producing an average of 2,275 gallons of
milk each per year.
A. providing them with high-energy feed, and milking them regularly, Holstein cows
are producing
B. providing them with high-energy feed, and milked regularly, the Holstein cow
produces
C. provided with high-energy feed, and milking them regularly, Holstein cows are
producing
D. provided with high-energy feed, and milked regularly, the Holstein cow produces
E. provided with high-energy feed, and milked regularly, Holstein cows will produce

Please provide explanations.
Last edited by f2001290 on Sat Jun 16, 2007 6:09 am, edited 1 time in total.
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by Nisha1218 » Sat Jun 16, 2007 6:04 am
I believe the answer is A.

My rationale:
- providing is better than provided because it is the farmer who is providing the the feed to the cows. Provided makes it sounds as if the farmer is the one who is being fed.
- cows need to be plural because "...the farmer who takes care of THEM..." If we use singular then we would need to change all the pronouns to "it, he/she"
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by Nisha1218 » Sat Jun 16, 2007 6:08 am
one more thing to add...

we are also being tested with parallelism in this question....

- providing is parallell with milking
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by drhomler » Sat Jun 16, 2007 6:11 am
For the farmer who takes care to keep them cool, providing them with high-energy feed,
and milking them regularly, Holstein cows are producing an average of 2,275 gallons of
milk each per year.
A. providing them with high-energy feed, and milking them regularly, Holstein cows
are producing
B. providing them with high-energy feed, and milked regularly, the Holstein cow
produces
C. provided with high-energy feed, and milking them regularly, Holstein cows are
producing
D. provided with high-energy feed, and milked regularly, the Holstein cow produces
E. provided with high-energy feed, and milked regularly, Holstein cows will produce

A "are producing" makes it sound like the cows are dong the action while the farm is too. B is not parallel neither is C and C makes the same verb tense error as A. Between D and E I go for E because it is a case and Effect the farme keeps them cool provided milked and therfore they will produce.

OA please
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by f2001290 » Sat Jun 16, 2007 7:39 am
OA is between A and E. I will wait for few more explanations.
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by jayhawk2001 » Sat Jun 16, 2007 9:09 am
Vote for E.

"A" has "are producing" which makes is sound illogical. Also, it sounds like
there's a condition here i.e. "for the farmer who ... cows will produce"

B and D use singular "cow" when the first sentence uses them. So,
incorrect.

C is not parallel.
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Vote for E

by man_dest » Tue Jun 19, 2007 1:20 pm
E says:

Farmer who takes care to keep them:
a) cool
b) provided with high-energy feed &
c) milked regularly

Therefore E is parallel (a, b & c are states of being)

A, on the other hand, says:

Farmer who takes care to:
a) keep them cool
b) providing them with high-energy feed
c) milking them regularly

This is nor parallel as keep is not parallel with providing and milking
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by jaspetrovic » Tue Jun 19, 2007 2:04 pm
I would still go w/A bc, we're not suppose to change the tense are producing w/will.
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by f2001290 » Wed Jun 20, 2007 2:46 am
OA is E
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by arunjithp » Mon Jun 25, 2007 3:32 am
For the farmer who...
... and milked them regularly...

it is not clear who milks whom... hence E is out of question..
i would go with A
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by lunarpower » Thu Jun 11, 2009 2:52 am
ugly, ugly, ugly.
ugly.

heh. it looks like choice (a) is an "indian trap"
seriously, not a joke.
if there is a single biggest issue in the grammar of second-language english speakers who happen to hail from india or pakistan, that issue is the drastic overuse of the "are ...ing" construction. (native speakers of english will recognize "are producing" at once as awkward.)

another problem with part (a) is the modifier. although "providing... and milking..." is a grammatically acceptable modifier, it doesn't make any sense in context, since these are not two things that farmers do WHILE or AS A CONSEQUENCE OF keeping the cows cool. (if you're going to use comma + -ing, then one of these two should hold.)
see #124 (og 12th edition) or #127 (og 11th edition), correct answer, for a sentence in which such a modifier actually does make sense.

the official answer, (e), is tricky indeed.

you have to parse it as follows:
you KEEP THE COWS cool
you KEEP THE COWS provided with...
and you KEEP THE COWS milked regularly

ugly. very ugly. but (e) is the least ugly of the bunch, so it wins the proverbial pageant.
i would much prefer "keep them cool, provide them with..., and milk them...", but that isn't there, of course.

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note that you also can't say "THE holstein cows", unless you're referencing a particular, specific, known group of holstein cows (something that you clearly aren't doing). since you're talking about holstein cows in general, you don't use the article "the".
this is another thing well known, totally subconsciously, to native speakers of english; it's hard-won wisdom for non-native speakers.
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by hemanth28 » Wed Jul 29, 2009 7:45 pm
lunarpower wrote:ugly, ugly, ugly.
ugly.

heh. it looks like choice (a) is an "indian trap"
seriously, not a joke.
if there is a single biggest issue in the grammar of second-language english speakers who happen to hail from india or pakistan, that issue is the drastic overuse of the "are ...ing" construction. (native speakers of english will recognize "are producing" at once as awkward.)
Ron .. This is exactly the reason i think your explanation is absolutely great. You have already observed enough indians to point out why they generally go wrong !!!

Drastic overuse of "are...ing" form. I totally agree.

Can you tell me wheather there are any rule that guides us when "are..ing" form should not be used.

Even I was trapped by A.

Also I thought that

"providing them with high-energy feed,and milking them regularly" is modifying takes care.

i.e he takes care by providing the cows with high energy feed, and milking them.

Can you please tell me whats wrong in my understanding !!
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by lunarpower » Tue Aug 04, 2009 12:14 am
hemanth28 wrote:"providing them with high-energy feed,and milking them regularly" is modifying takes care.
this can't work, because a list of only 2 items can NEVER have a comma between the options.

i.e., if that were a modifier, then it would have to be "providing them with high-quality feed and milking them regularly", WITHOUT the intervening comma.

this is a hard and fast rule, and is enough of a reason to declare choice (a) incorrect even without the additional observation of the "indian trap".

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by praachiee » Tue Mar 26, 2013 9:49 pm
Ron
this can't work, because a list of only 2 items can NEVER have a comma between the options.
The option E: E. provided with high-energy feed, and milked regularly, Holstein cows will produce
Also has a comma between a list of 2 items. In such a case, how can we use the above quoted rule to eliminate a wrong answer?
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by lunarpower » Wed Mar 27, 2013 2:00 am
praachiee wrote:Ron
this can't work, because a list of only 2 items can NEVER have a comma between the options.
The option E: E. provided with high-energy feed, and milked regularly, Holstein cows will produce
Also has a comma between a list of 2 items. In such a case, how can we use the above quoted rule to eliminate a wrong answer?
in that choice, those are only 2 of the 3 elements in a list. the word "cool", which precedes the underline, is also a component of the list.
so, that list is punctuated as is normal for a list of 3 items ("x, y, and z").
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