Native of vs. Native to

[dslewis]

Is there a rule to know when to use native of vs. native to or is it question specific?

[dslewis]

is native of only used for people? Thats what I have heard can someone confirm or deny.

[RonPurewal]

is native of only used for people? Thats what I have heard can someone confirm or deny.

'native of' is used only for people, yes.

the situation is a little more complicated for 'native to', which could potentially refer either to people or to other species. this expression is meant to refer to whomever or whatever is indigenous to a particular area.
if my friend jake was born and raised in arizona, then jake is a native of arizona.
if my friend jake is navajo, then he's a member of an indian tribe native to arizona.

[ilyana777]

Hello!

Would these sentences be considered incorrect on the GMAT?
The kangaroo is a native of Australia. - the sentence is from Collins English dictionary
The English elm tree,a native of Europe, has been
widely planted in North America. - this is from a language forum where it is considered correct.

So far, I saw two problems in the internet on this "native to" vs. "native of" issue. In the first one ("The Red-tailed Sportive Lemur") you could eliminate on the basis of "noun" vs. "adjective" (the noun, which requires preposition "of", must have article there). In the second one ("Bufo marinus toads") we can eliminate all the wrong choices without even considering this issue. However, in some choices there is this structure:
Toads are natives of South America.
I wonder whether this structure will be correct if we assume that the sentences above about kangaroo and elm tree are correct.

[RonPurewal]

Hello!

Would these sentences be considered incorrect on the GMAT?
The kangaroo is a native of Australia. - the sentence is from Collins English dictionary

The use of "a native of..." for animals/plants, rather than for people, would definitely be very strange. I can't possibly imagine that GMAC would do such a thing in a correct answer.

When you look at dictionaries, remember that many of the usages shown will be dated, obscure, geographically limited, and/or just plain weird.

The English elm tree,a native of Europe, has been
widely planted in North America. - this is from a language forum where it is considered correct.

Unless you were trying to personify the tree... nah.

By the way, the chance that GMAC is ever going to test this kind of thing is, essentially, 0%.
In the (extremely unlikely) event that this difference appears in a problem, it's certain to be tested along with other, more important, issues.