Это дали собак

[gnomygnomy.livejournal.com]

I'm having trouble making sense of this sentence.

Here's the context:
Person 1: А откуда удочка у Мамы Свинки?
Person 2: Это дали собак.

I understand собак is the genitive plural of собака. I'm wondering if the reason it's in genitive form is to give the effect of "some", as in, "some dogs gave it". Am I close?

Comments

The sentence is wrong

[lion-casserole.livejournal.com]

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I would propose some reasonable versions of this wording :

- Это подарок [ от ] собак. -- This is a gift from hounds.
- Это [ ей ] дали собаки.

Please be careful with kid's sentences, children are great inventors :).

Re: The sentence is wrong

[gnomygnomy.livejournal.com]

I'm definitely treading uneasy waters with this task. For one, I'm a little rusty with my own Russian skills, so it's hard for me to make a judgment about grammatical accuracy without looking it up first. Even then, sometimes there are colloquial usages I wouldn't know, so I have to make sure I'm not overlooking them. Plus, children speak so quickly and tend to have immature speech sounds. This is quite the challenge for me! But so interesting, all the same. :)

Indeed it is :)

[lion-casserole.livejournal.com]

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This is why we are entering here - it is both fun and productive.