養う (yashinau) conjugation
to rear, to maintain, to cultivate
養う (やしなう, yashinau) is a godan verb. Godan verbs change their final kana up and down its column of the kana chart — the a-row for negatives, the i-row before ます, the e-row for potential and ば. Every form below is tappable — hear it, then say it back.
Conjugation table
| Form | Plain (casual) | Polite (~ます) | When you use it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dictionary / plain | 養う yashinau | 養います yashinaimasu | The form you look up. Also the casual present and future. |
| Plain negative | 養わない yashinawanai | 養いません yashinaimasen | “doesn’t / won’t”. From here it conjugates like an i-adjective. |
| Plain past | 養った yashinatta | 養いました yashinaimashita | The casual past — same ending as the te-form, with た/だ. |
| Plain past negative | 養わなかった yashinawanakatta | 養いませんでした yashinaimasendeshita | “didn’t”. The negative past, still i-adjective-shaped. |
| Te-form | 養って yashinatte | — | The connector: requests, linking clauses, ~ている. |
| Progressive (~ている) | 養っている yashinatteiru | 養っています yashinatteimasu | “is ~ing”, or an ongoing resulting state. |
| Desire (~たい) | 養いたい yashinaitai | 養いたいです yashinaitaidesu | “want to ~”. Behaves as an i-adjective. |
| Volitional | 養おう yashinaou | 養いましょう yashinaimashou | “let’s ~” / “I think I’ll ~”. |
| Potential | 養える yashinaeru | 養えます yashinaemasu | “can ~”. What you could do; the object often takes が. |
| Passive | 養われる yashinawareru | 養われます yashinawaremasu | “is ~ed”. Also the honorific and the suffering passive. |
| Causative | 養わせる yashinawaseru | 養わせます yashinawasemasu | Make or let someone do it. |
| Causative-passive | 養わされる yashinawasareru | 養わされます yashinawasaremasu | Be made to do it — the long one. |
| Imperative | 養え yashinae | 養ってください yashinattekudasai | Blunt order. Use ~てください in real life. |
| Prohibitive | 養うな yashinauna | — | “don’t!” — dictionary form + な. |
| Conditional (~ば) | 養えば yashinaeba | — | “if ~”. General rules and hypotheticals. |
| Conditional (~たら) | 養ったら yashinattara | — | “if / when ~”. The everyday conditional. |
🔊 Tap any Japanese word to hear it spoken.
Why it conjugates this way
Godan verbs change their final kana up and down its column of the kana chart — the a-row for negatives, the i-row before ます, the e-row for potential and ば.
See the full rules on the verb conjugation guide.