Jerry has a flock of chickens. The red chickens produce 3 eggs a day, and the white chickens produce 5 eggs a day. Every day Jerry collects 42 eggs. If he has two more white chickens than red chickens, how many red chickens does he have?
First, set up the equation for the number of eggs the chickens lay each day: 3r + 5w = 42, where r is the number of red chickens and w is the number of white chickens.
Then, express r in terms of w based on the information in the problem: w = r + <<+2=2>>2
Now substitute r + 2 for w in the equation for the number of eggs: 3r + 5(r + 2) = 42
Now multiply 5 through the parentheses: 3r + 5r + 10 = 42
Now add like terms to get 8r + 10 = 42
Now subtract 10 from both sides of the equation: 8r = 32
Finally, divide both sides of the equation by 8 to get r = 4
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