---
title: The famous video says the wolves «changed the rivers», but scientist… — Wolves in Yellowstone, beavers in Britain and br… · tree and pragmatics
description: The famous video says the wolves «changed the rivers», but scientists say the story is more complicated, because bears, people and weather mattered too; still, the main lesson holds: top predators shape the whole web. Who acts: famous video, wolves, scientists, story. A sentence of the lesson «Wolve
---

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# Wolves in Yellowstone, beavers in Britain and bringing nature back, sentence 3

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The famous video says the wolves «changed the rivers», but scientists say the story is more complicated, because bears, people and weather mattered too; still, the main lesson holds: top predators shape the whole web.

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**Who acts:** famous video, wolves, scientists, story, bears, main lesson · **What happens:** say, change, be, matter, hold, shape · **To what, where:** rivers, whole web · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of the lesson «Wolves in Yellowstone, beavers in Britain and bringing nature back» of the biology course of Mova's primary school. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (famous video, wolves, scientists, story), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = school:biology:283-wolves-in-yellowstone-beavers-in-britain-and-bringing-nature-back.lesson:3
# text = The famous video says the wolves «changed the rivers», but scientists say the story is more complicated, because bears, people and weather mattered too; still, the main lesson holds: top predators shape the whole web.
# source = school lesson (ours)
# course = biology
# lesson = 283-wolves-in-yellowstone-beavers-in-britain-and-bringing-nature-back.lesson
# annotation = Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R6-punct-agree ×1
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	famous	famous	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
3	video	video	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	says	say	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	wolves	wolf	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	nsubj	_	_
7	«	«	PUNCT	``	_	8	punct	_	_
8	changed	change	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	ccomp	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	rivers	river	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	obj	_	_
11	»	»	PUNCT	''	_	8	punct	_	Agree=R6-punct-agree|Haiku=10:punct
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
13	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
14	scientists	scientist	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	nsubj	_	_
15	say	say	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	nsubj	_	_
18	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	20	cop	_	_
19	more	more	ADV	RBR	Degree=Cmp	20	advmod	_	_
20	complicated	complicated	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	ccomp	_	_
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
22	because	because	SCONJ	IN	_	28	mark	_	_
23	bears	bear	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	28	nsubj	_	_
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
25	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	23	conj	_	_
26	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	27	cc	_	_
27	weather	weather	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	conj	_	_
28	mattered	matter	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	advcl	_	_
29	too	too	ADV	RB	_	28	advmod	_	_
30	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	36	punct	_	_
31	still	still	ADV	RB	_	36	advmod	_	_
32	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	31	punct	_	_
33	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	35	det	_	_
34	main	main	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	35	amod	_	_
35	lesson	lesson	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	36	nsubj	_	_
36	holds	hold	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
37	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	40	punct	_	_
38	top	top	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	39	amod	_	_
39	predators	predator	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	40	nsubj	_	_
40	shape	shape	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	36	ccomp	_	_
41	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	43	det	_	_
42	whole	whole	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	43	amod	_	_
43	web	web	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	40	obj	_	_
44	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .note -->
No stored speech act for this sentence.

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | present | the famous video |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **change** *in a quote* | past | the wolves | the rivers |  |  |  |  | vn dress-41.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent river=Patient |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | present | scientists |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **is** | present | the story |  |  |  |  | complicated *property* | tree rules |
| 5 | **matter** | past | bears and people and weather |  |  |  |  |  | vn matter-91 «NP V»: agent=Stimulus |
| 6 | **hold** | present | the main lesson |  |  |  | still |  | vn conjecture-29.5 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 7 | **shape** | present | top predators | the whole web |  |  |  |  | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset web=Product |

<!-- .note -->
One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

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**Licence: [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)**, as the whole of Mova corpus 0.4, of which this treebank (the agreed school, `mova-school-agreed-en.conllu`) is part. The lessons were written for Mova's primary school. Sentence `school:biology:283-wolves-in-yellowstone-beavers-in-britain-and-bringing-nature-back.lesson:3`.

**The tree:** Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R6-punct-agree ×1. **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the lesson read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence.

See the [release 0.4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/releases/0.4/).

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