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Snappy Posted 16 years ago
Grammar

How do I say this?

If there is a botanical garden that has 5,000 plants and 500 species, is it possible to say:

"There are 500 species of 5,000 plants in this botanical garden."?
or
"There are 5,000 plants, comprised of 500 species in this botanical garden."?
  

Top answer

You need a second comma in your second sentence, but 'comprise' is always a confusing verb, throwing grammarians into prescriptive tantrums. I suggest this: There are 500 species and 5000 plants in this botanical garden.

— Mister Micawber

  • You need a second comma in your second sentence, but 'comprise' is always a confusing verb, throwing grammarians into prescriptive tantrums.
  • I suggest this: There are 500 species and 5000 plants in this botanical garden.
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3 Answers
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You need a second comma in your second sentence, but 'comprise' is always a confusing verb, throwing grammarians into prescriptive tantrums. I suggest this:

There are 500 species and 5000 plants in this botanical garden.
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Can you please tell me what's wrong with-
There are 500 species of 5,000 plants in this botanical garden.

If the relation denoted by 'of' needs to be conveyed what do we do?
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Which relation of 'of' are you speaking of-- there are dozens of uses of the word, as you can see from my sentence. Anyway, your sentence is wrong, but you can say this:

There are 5000 plants of 500 species....
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