Question

Plant Selection All holly plants are dioecious—a male plant must be planted within 30 to 40 feet of the female plants in order to yield berries. A home improvement store has 12 unmarked holly plants for sale, 8 of which are female. If a homeowner buys 3 plants at random, what is the probability that berries will be produced?

Answer 1

Combination formula:

The number of possible combinations of r objects from the set of n objects can be written as in the following ways.

Formula:

Given,

A home improvement store has 12 unmarked holly plants for sale, 8 of which are female. So, the remaining 4 are male.

Three plants are selected at random, there are,

If the berries will be produced, these 3 plants consists of,

1 Male and 2 Female or

2 Male and 1 Female

Find the probability that berries will be produced.

That is,