Riddle Answer: 30 cows in a field, 28 chickens, how many didn’t?

There are 30 cows in a field. 28 chickens. How many didn't?

Answer: 10 (ten) cows didn't

Breaking Down the Wordplay

"There are 30 cows in a field."

• This part sets up the scenario, establishing a total of 30 cows in a field.
• It's a straightforward statement that doesn't contain any wordplay.

"28 chickens."

• Here's where the wordplay begins. "28" is meant to be heard as "twenty ate" (20 ate).
• The mention of chickens is a red herring, intended to distract from the pun.

"How many didn't?"

• This question relies on interpreting "28" as "twenty ate".
• If twenty cows ate, then the number that didn't eat is 10 (30 total cows minus 20 that ate).

Linguistic Analysis

This riddle cleverly exploits the homophonic nature of "28" and "twenty ate" in English:

• It relies on auditory perception rather than visual reading.
• The riddle works best when spoken aloud or heard, as the written numbers might not immediately trigger the wordplay.
• It demonstrates how homophones (words that sound the same but have different meanings or spellings) can create amusing ambiguities in language.

Mathematical Misdirection

The riddle employs several tactics to create confusion:

• It introduces an irrelevant number (28) and an unrelated animal (chickens) to distract from the core wordplay.
• It requires the listener to perform a simple subtraction (30 - 20 = 10) to arrive at the answer.
• The presence of multiple numbers (30, 28) may lead some to attempt more complex calculations unnecessarily.

More riddles like this one: our riddles about cows, the chicken riddles to crack you up, our number riddles with answers or the classic “not a door” riddle.

Why the answer is 10

This riddle only works when it is spoken. Written down, "28 chickens" looks like a count of birds, and your brain starts to do math with 30 and 28. Out loud, "twenty-eight" sounds just like "twenty ate." The chickens are a red herring, a clue put there to lead you in the wrong direction. Once you hear that twenty cows ate, the question "how many didn't?" has a clear answer.

Many people answer 2, because 30 minus 28 is 2, and that is exactly the mistake the riddle is hoping for. Others ask "didn't what?", which is a smart question, because the riddle never says what the missing action is. That missing verb is the clue. If you tell this riddle in writing, it is almost impossible to solve, so it is best told aloud at the dinner table, spoken quickly and with a straight face.

Where this riddle comes from

This is a spoken riddle of unknown origin that is often shared online and in classrooms. It is a homophone riddle, where a number sounds like a different word. Number puns like "two" and "too" or "eight" and "ate" appear in many jokes, and the riddles below play with numbers in the same spirit.

3 more riddles like this one