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I have two fish tanks at home: a freshwater tank and a saltwater tank.
If I start new containers of food for each tank on the same day, which container will run out first?
Justify your answer.
One way to determine which container will run out first is to make a table that keeps track of how much food is consumed in each tank.
The freshwater fish eat three meals of 18 g each day, so they consume 18 × 3 = 54 g per day.
The saltwater fish eat two meals of 25 g each day, so they consume 25 × 2 = 50 g per day.
We will continue tracking the amount of food consumed until we reach one of the container limits (750 g for freshwater, 500 g for saltwater).
On Day 10, the saltwater fish will have consumed exactly 500 g of food, which is the size of their container. The freshwater fish have not yet consumed 750 g of food. So the saltwater fish food container will run out first.
Alternatively, we could use division to determine which container will run out first:
This confirms that the saltwater fish food container will run out first, lasting exactly 10 days, while the freshwater fish food container will last nearly 14 days.
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