# Another 6th grade math word problem.

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-6th-grade-math-word-problem/266836>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [September 30, 2004, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-6th-grade-math-word-problem/266836 "2004-09-30T13:19:06Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![rjk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ed655f/32.png) [@rjk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjk)\
**Post date:** [October 6, 2004, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-6th-grade-math-word-problem/266836/41 "2004-10-06T05:15:21Z")

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> [@Honey](#):
>
> In [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=277257) I asked for help with a math problem and received such good responses that I was able to guide my daughter into figuring out the problem for herself. 🙂
> 
> Well, I have another problem (I really do suck at math). I know the board rules on homework help and I want to assure the mods that the answers to these questions are not given to my daughter. They are used as a way of guiding her into figuring out the problem on her own.
> 
> The problem:
> 
> Farmer Brown sells turkey eggs. They are for people with large appetites. His 100 turkeys lay 10,000 every 100 days.  
> How many days will it take to lay 1 egg?
> 
> If I’ve learned anything from the last problem then I think I should disregard the number of turkeys. But I’m coming up with the turkeys laying 100 eggs a day, which can’t be right. Can you guys and girls help again? 😕

As noted above, the question is badly phrased. What the teacher probably meant to ask is “How many days will **1 turkey** take to lay 1 egg?” (I see on preview that **moriah** beat me to this rephrasing.)

In that case, you don’t want to disregard the number of turkeys, but the time instead. We have 100 turkeys laying 10,000 eggs in \<some time\>, so how many eggs does 1 turkey lay in \<some time\>? 10,000/100 = 100 eggs. Since \<some time\> = 100 days, we have 1 egg per day.

(This problem is an old standard, though it usually involves the rate of digging ditches or laying bricks. The usual solution is to set aside the value you’re looking for while you simplify the others as I did above.)

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