Если кто‑нибудь забудет полить растения, листья быстро станут пыльными и грустными.

If someone forgets to water the plants, the leaves quickly become dusty and sad.

Breakdown of Если кто‑нибудь забудет полить растения, листья быстро станут пыльными и грустными.

• и: and
• если: if
• быстро: quickly
• стать: to become
• забыть: to forget
• лист: the leaf
• грустный: sad
• кто-нибудь: someone
• растение: the plant
• пыльный: dusty
• полить: to water

Questions & Answers about Если кто‑нибудь забудет полить растения, листья быстро станут пыльными и грустными.

Why does the sentence start with если plus a future verb забудет? In English we say “If someone forgets…”, using the present.

Russian uses если + future tense to talk about future conditions:

• Если кто‑нибудь забудет полить растения…
  literally: If someone will forget to water the plants…

In English, conditionals about the future usually use the present (“if someone forgets”), but in Russian the natural form is future:

• Present: кто‑нибудь забывает – “someone forgets (habitually)”
• Future: кто‑нибудь забудет – “someone will forget (on some occasion)”

Because this is about a possible future event (on some day someone might forget), the future забудет is correct after если here.

What’s the difference between кто‑нибудь and кто‑то? Could I say если кто‑то забудет…?

Both mean roughly “someone,” but the nuance is slightly different:

• кто‑то – “someone” (more specific/definite in the speaker’s mind, though still unidentified)
• кто‑нибудь – “someone / anyone” (more indefinite, “whoever it might be”)

In a conditional like this, кто‑нибудь sounds a bit more like “if anyone (at all) forgets…”, which fits well.

You could say:

• Если кто‑то забудет полить растения…

That would still be correct, just with a slightly more “some particular person” flavor, rather than “anyone/whichever person.”

Why is the verb забудет singular, even though кто‑нибудь can mean “anyone” (which feels plural in English)?

In Russian, кто‑нибудь is grammatically singular and masculine:

• It behaves like кто (“who”):
  • кто‑нибудь забудет – someone will forget
  • кто‑нибудь придёт – someone will come

Even though in English anyone/someone can feel like “people in general,” in Russian the verb always agrees with кто‑нибудь in the 3rd person singular. So забудет (not забудут) is required.

Why is it забудет полить растения and not something like забудет про полив растений? How does “forget to do something” work in Russian?

The usual pattern for “forget to do something” in Russian is:

• забыть
  • infinitive

So:

• забыть полить растения – to forget to water the plants
• забыть позвонить другу – to forget to call a friend

Your alternative забыть про полив растений would be understood, but it’s more like “forget about the watering of the plants” (focus on the “watering” as an abstract action), not “forget to water (this time).”

The given sentence uses the natural, everyday structure: забудет полить (forget to water).

Why is it полить and not поливать?

Полить and поливать are different aspects:

• полить – perfective: “to water (once, completely, as a single action)”
• поливать – imperfective: “to be watering / to water regularly, in general”

Here we’re talking about one specific missed action in the future:

• “If someone forgets to water the plants (on that occasion)…”

So the perfective infinitive полить is appropriate: a single act of watering that was supposed to happen but may be forgotten.

If you used поливать, it would sound like “forget to be watering (regularly),” which doesn’t fit as naturally.

What case is растения in, and how do I know?

Растения here is accusative plural, the direct object of полить:

• полить что? – растения (water what? – the plants)

For most neuter nouns ending in ‑е in the singular (растение), the plural ‑я form is the same in nominative and accusative:

• Nominative plural: растения – plants (as subject)
• Accusative plural (inanimate): растения – plants (as object)

So you identify the case by the role in the sentence: since it’s “water the plants,” it must be accusative.

Why is it листья and not something like листы?

Both листья and листы exist, but they mean different things:

• лист – “leaf” (of a plant) / “sheet” (of paper)
  • plural (for plant leaves): листья
  • plural (for paper sheets): листы

In this sentence we’re talking about plant leaves, so the correct plural is листья:

• листья растения – the leaves of the plant
• листы бумаги – sheets of paper

So листья быстро станут… = “the leaves will quickly become…”

Why do we use станут instead of будут in листья быстро станут пыльными и грустными?

Both быть and стать can be translated as “to be / to become,” but:

• быть (будут) – describes a state
• стать (станут) – emphasizes change, “to become, to turn into”

Here we’re talking about the leaves changing from normal to dirty and “sad,” so стать is better:

• Листья быстро станут пыльными и грустными.
  – “The leaves will quickly become dusty and sad.”

If you said листья будут пыльными и грустными, it would sound more like a description of how they will be (in general), not the idea of them turning that way as a result of forgetting to water them.

Why are пыльными and грустными in the instrumental case after станут?

With the verb стать (“to become”), Russian typically uses the instrumental case to describe what someone/something becomes:

• стать кем? чем? – “become who? what?”

So in plural:

• листья станут какими? – пыльными, грустными

That’s why the adjectives are in instrumental plural:

• пыльный → пыльными
• грустный → грустными

Similar patterns:

• Он стал врачом. – He became a doctor.
• Дети стали шумными. – The children became noisy.

How do the endings ‑ыми in пыльными and грустными work?

These are instrumental plural adjective endings for hard‑stem adjectives:

Base forms (masculine singular nominative):

• пыльный – dusty
• грустный – sad

Cases:

• Nominative plural: пыльные, грустные (what kind of leaves? – dusty, sad)
• Instrumental plural: пыльными, грустными (become what? – dusty, sad)

Pattern for many hard‑stem adjectives:

• ‑ый / ‑ий → ‑ыми in instrumental plural
• новый → новыми
• синий → синими

So листья станут пыльными и грустными uses the instrumental plural to match листья (plural) after станут.

Is the word order листья быстро станут пыльными и грустными fixed? Could I move быстро?

Russian word order is relatively flexible, especially with adverbs like быстро:

All of these are grammatically correct:

• Листья быстро станут пыльными и грустными.
• Листья станут быстро пыльными и грустными.
• Быстро листья станут пыльными и грустными.

Nuances:

• Листья быстро станут… – neutral, very natural; emphasis a bit on how fast it happens.
• Листья станут быстро пыльными… – focuses more on “become quickly dusty,” slightly different rhythm.
• Быстро листья станут… – puts strong emphasis on “quickly,” a bit more expressive.

The original order is the most common, neutral choice.

Why is there a comma before листья? How do commas work with если clauses?

In Russian, a clause introduced by если (“if”) is a subordinate clause. When it’s followed by a main clause, they’re usually separated by a comma:

• Если кто‑нибудь забудет полить растения, листья быстро станут пыльными и грустными.
  – [если‑clause], [main clause].

If you reverse the order, you still use a comma:

• Листья быстро станут пыльными и грустными, если кто‑нибудь забудет полить растения.

So the comma marks the boundary between the condition (если…) and the result (листья станут…).

Is it normal in Russian to say that leaves become грустными (“sad”)? Is that idiomatic or just poetic?

Using грустный (“sad”) about leaves is a bit figurative and emotional, but very natural in everyday Russian. People often personify plants and objects:

• грустные цветы – sad flowers
• уставшие растения – tired plants
• весёлые огоньки – cheerful lights

In the sentence, грустными suggests that the leaves look lifeless, droopy, unhappy because they weren’t watered. It’s not a set idiom, but it’s a common, expressive way to talk about plants.