Learn Spanish (Latin America): Deseábamos que ustedes plantaran más flores. - We wished that you would plant more flowers.

To form the imperfect subjunctive, start with the third-person plural (ellos/ellas/ustedes) form of the preterite (simple past) tense. For plantar, that is plantaron. Drop the -ron at the end to get the stem (planta-), and then add the new imperfect subjunctive ending. For ustedes, the ending is -ran, giving us plantaran.

Why do we use the past subjunctive (plantaran) here instead of the present subjunctive (planten)?

The verb desear (to wish) expresses a desire, which triggers the subjunctive mood for the second verb. We have to use the past (imperfect) subjunctive because the main verb, deseábamos (we wished), is in the past tense. The two halves of the sentence need to agree in time.

The translation says "would plant." Why don't we use the Spanish conditional tense (plantarían)?

In English, we often use "would" to express what we want someone else to do in a hypothetical situation (like "I wish you would..."). In Spanish, you cannot use the conditional tense after a verb of wishing. The grammar rules of desear strictly require the subjunctive mood, so we use plantaran.

Why does deseábamos have a written accent mark, but plantaran does not?