Question

The Brittle Bird Store prepares bird-seed mixtures by mixing sunflower seeds and millet and packaging them as 5-pound bags for sale. If sunflower seed (s) is regularly sold for $1.75 per pound, and millet (m) is sold for $2.50 per pound, what system of equations could be used to calculate how many pounds of sunflower seed is added to the mixture if the store sells the mixture for $15?

a) (s + m = 15), (1.75s + 2.5m = 5)
b) (s + m = 15), (1.75s + 2.5m = 15)
c) (s + m = 5), (1.75s + 2.5m = 15)
d) (4.25(s + m) = 15), (s + m = 5)

Answer 1

The correct system of equations to calculate the pounds of sunflower seeds and millet in a mixture is (s + m = 5) and (1.75s + 2.5m = 15), which is option c) from the provided choices.

Step-by-step explanation:

The question involves finding a system of equations that could be used to determine the amount of sunflower seeds (s) and millet (m) in a bird-seed mixture. Each 5-pound bag of the mixture is sold for $15. Sunflower seeds are sold at $1.75 per pound and millet at $2.50 per pound.

The correct system of equations for this scenario is (s + m = 5), which represents the total weight of the mixture, and (1.75s + 2.5m = 15), which represents the total cost of the mixture. Option c) provides these equations. The first equation comes from the fact that each bag is 5 pounds, so the sum of the weights of sunflower seeds and millet must equal 5. The second equation represents the cost of the seeds within the bag, where $1.75 is the cost per pound of sunflower seeds and $2.50 is the cost per pound of millet. The total cost for the 5-pound bag is $15.