On a farm there are chicken and horses. There are a total of 79 heads and 176 legs. How many chickens are on the farm?
A horse has 1 pair of front legs and 1 pair of back legs. A chicken
has only 1 pair of "front" legs, and no back legs.
Since there are 176 legs, there are 88 leg-pairs. Each of the 79
heads has 1 front leg-pair under it, so 79 of the leg-pairs are front
leg-pairs, and the remaining 9 leg pairs are back leg-pairs. They
belong to the horses, so there are 9 horses, and the other 70
animals are chickens.
Edwin