Breakdown of Звери, обитающие в этом лесу, прячутся в глубокие норы.
этот
this [f: эта, n: это]
в
in / to (direction)
зверь
wild animal
лес
forest, wood
прятаться
to hide
глубокий
deep
обитать
to inhabit
нора
burrow
Questions & Answers about Звери, обитающие в этом лесу, прячутся в глубокие норы.
How do we unpack the active participle обитающие back into a который clause?
You would say которые обитают. The participle обитающие (living/inhabiting) is in the nominative plural to agree with the subject звери. Since it is an active present participle, it elegantly replaces the relative pronoun которые and the present-tense verb обитают.
Why does лес end in -у here (в этом лесу) instead of the standard prepositional -е?
Лес is one of a small group of short masculine nouns that takes a special locative ending (sometimes called the second prepositional case) when combined with the prepositions в or на to indicate a physical location. Therefore, it is always в лесу.
Why is the destination в глубокие норы (accusative) rather than в глубоких норах (prepositional) if they are hiding inside them?
In Russian, the verb прятаться (to hide oneself) strongly focuses on the action of getting into a hiding spot. Because it describes this direction of motion (where into), it triggers the accusative case for the destination rather than the prepositional case used for static location.
Could I use животные instead of звери to mean animals in this sentence?
Yes, but звери is a very natural and evocative choice for this specific context. While животные is the broad biological word for all animals, звери specifically refers to wild beasts or land mammals (like foxes, badgers, or wolves) living in nature.
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