"¿Poder los gorilas nadan?" - Valid sentence?

Question

1. Is the sentence correct as far as gender and agreement. My guess is yes because los is plural, gorilas is plural, and nadan is plural.

2. My guess is the translation in English is "Are gorillas able to swim?"

3. Has anybody seen a gorilla swim for a fact? My guess is the teacher is kidding around?

Answer 1

What Tony said, but I'd probably say it the other way, "¿Pueden nadar los gorilas?"

I've never seen or heard of gorillas swimming.

to me it sounds more natural to say "¿los gorilas pueden nadar?", but... "¿pueden nadar los gorilas?", or even "¿pueden los gorilas nadar?"... can be used - Tonyriva, Nov 19, 2010

Thanks. I guess I still think of my high school Spanish teacher telling us to reverse the word order for questions compared to statements. - KevinB, Nov 19, 2010

I would say it same way, Kevin. - 00e657d4, Nov 19, 2010

Guillermo ..... same as kevin or tony? - patch, Nov 19, 2010

Answer 2

hmm... it's wrong...

it should be...

¿Los gorilas pueden nadar?

and... yes it means "are gorillas able to swim?"

hmm... I haven't seen gorillas swimming... yet again, I haven't seen gorillas out of a zoo, or out of Animal Planet... - Tonyriva, Nov 19, 2010

Answer 3

Technicaly if you are talking about their mental not physical ability to swim you would say. : Saben las gorilas nadar. Poder would indicate the physical ability to swim . Saber would indicate -do they know how to swim. ---- Sergio