Трекинговые палки лежат рядом с развилкой.

Because the sentence is talking about more than one pole.

• палка = a stick / pole
• палки = poles

Here, палки is nominative plural, because it is the subject of the sentence: the trekking poles are the thing doing the lying.

The adjective трекинговые also has to be plural to match палки.

Russian adjectives must agree with the noun they describe in:

• gender
• number
• case

Here:

• палки is plural
• it is in the nominative case
• so the adjective also takes the plural nominative form

That gives:

• трекинговый → masculine singular
• трекинговая → feminine singular
• трекинговое → neuter singular
• трекинговые → plural

So трекинговые палки means trekking poles.

Because the subject is plural.

• лежит = lies, is lying for one thing
• лежат = lie, are lying for more than one thing

Since палки is plural, the verb must also be plural:

• Палка лежит = The pole is lying.
• Палки лежат = The poles are lying.

Russian often uses more specific verbs for position instead of a general to be.

Here, лежать means to lie, to be lying, or to be in a horizontal position.

So:

• палки лежат = the poles are lying on the ground / lying there

This is very natural in Russian. With physical objects, Russian often cares about their position:

• стоять = to stand
• лежать = to lie
• висеть = to hang
• сидеть = to sit

Since trekking poles would normally be on the ground horizontally, лежат is the natural choice.

Рядом с means next to, beside, or near.

It is a fixed expression:

• рядом = nearby / next to
• с = with

But together, рядом с functions like next to.

Examples:

• рядом с домом = next to the house
• рядом с дорогой = near the road
• рядом с развилкой = near the fork

So you should learn рядом с as a set phrase.

Because рядом с requires the instrumental case.

The noun развилка is feminine singular. Its basic form is:

• развилка = fork, branching point

After рядом с, it changes to the instrumental:

• развилка → развилкой

So:

• рядом с развилкой = next to the fork

This is a very common pattern in Russian:

• с другом = with a friend
• перед школой = in front of the school
• рядом с развилкой = next to the fork

Развилка usually means a fork, branching point, or split in a road, path, or trail.

In this sentence, it most likely means:

• a fork in the trail
• a place where one path splits into two directions

That fits very naturally with trekking or hiking context.

So рядом с развилкой would mean something like near the fork in the path.

Yes, it is understandable and natural, especially in modern Russian.

трекинговый is a borrowing-based adjective from trekking. So:

• трекинговые палки = trekking poles

You may also sometimes hear:

• палочки для треккинга
• палки для ходьбы
• скандинавские палки in some contexts, though that can mean Nordic walking poles, not exactly the same thing

For hiking equipment, трекинговые палки is a good, standard phrase.

Yes. Russian word order is more flexible than English because case endings show grammatical relationships.

The neutral order here is:

• Трекинговые палки лежат рядом с развилкой.

But you could also say:

• Рядом с развилкой лежат трекинговые палки.

This version puts more focus on where they are.

Both are correct. The difference is mainly about emphasis, not basic meaning.

You can tell from both case and verb agreement.

1. палки matches the verb

The verb is лежат, which is plural.
палки is plural, so it matches naturally as the subject.

2. развилкой is in the instrumental case

The ending -ой shows it is not the subject here. It is part of the phrase рядом с развилкой.

So the structure is:

• Трекинговые палки = subject
• лежат = verb
• рядом с развилкой = location phrase

The usual stresses are:

• тре́кинговые
• па́лки
• лежа́т
• ря́дом
• с разви́лкой

So the whole sentence is pronounced approximately as:

Тре́кинговые па́лки лежа́т ря́дом с разви́лкой.

Stress is important in Russian, so it is worth learning words together with their stress.

Yes, grammatically it could:

• Трекинговые палки находятся рядом с развилкой.

That means The trekking poles are located near the fork.

But it sounds more formal, abstract, or less natural in an everyday physical scene. For actual objects resting somewhere, лежат is usually better and more vivid.

So in this sentence:

• лежат = the most natural everyday choice

It can mean either, depending on context.

• next to
• beside
• near

It does not always mean immediately touching. It often just means close by.

So рядом с развилкой could mean:

• right beside the fork
• close to the fork in the trail

The exact distance depends on context.