Jump to content
BrainDen.com - Brain Teasers
  • 0


bonanova
 Share

Question

You should get at least ten good tomatoes from each of these plants, the man was told. Sounds good, he said, and the sale was made. He took them home to his garden, where he planted them in five rows of four each. It was a good growing year, weather-wise. But when the man finally counted his crop he found it totaled just 159 tomatoes. But the man was greatly pleased. He thought, I'll surely recommend that place to my friends.

Assuming the man had at least a high-school education, explain his reasoning.

Later ... patience.

Use the spoiler Luke.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 answers to this question

Recommended Posts

  • 0

The man planted them in star formation.

(edit: my star did not look anything like a star. the dots did not align right. my previous edit was to try to change that. that didn't work, so....sorry. no visual.)

That means he had 12 tomato plants, which would produce at minimum 120 tomatoes. He got 39 more than minimum, which is a reason to reccomend your friends!

Edited by Kay
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 0

rows were overlapping, meaning there would only be a row of eight (if my math is correct, that would have five rows with four tomatoe plants in it) Thus having 10*8 plants is 80 which is what the seller expected, but the man really got 159. I think that works does it not?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 0
rows were overlapping, meaning there would only be a row of eight (if my math is correct, that would have five rows with four tomatoe plants in it) Thus having 10*8 plants is 80 which is what the seller expected, but the man really got 159. I think that works does it not?

Well, you have the best answer so far, in terms of lowest number of tomato plants. B))

But the rows are not collinear, they are distinct -- "a row" can't be "five rows."

Everyone is on the right track.

But no one has the lowest possible number of plants, yet... ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Answer this question...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
 Share

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...