What would you say are the BEST tempered, GOOD laying, NICE looking hens?

[micstrachan]

Brown Leghorns. Mine was an absolute sweetheart, smart, beautiful, alert, and a strong layer since she was a production breed.

 

[LonestarVol]

Which sorts of chicken would you say have a nice temperament, are good layers and look nice.
I saw that leghorns look nice and lay about 300 eggs per year, but can be unfriendly, what would you say? If they are raised from chicks, will they be friendly?

Sapphire Gems. Mine layed well over 300 this past year and never slowed down over winter. Large, with many double-yolk jumbos, brown eggs. They are beautiful birds that eat out of my hands.

 

[LonestarVol]

Sapphire Gem

 

[moglie2]

Which sorts of chicken would you say have a nice temperament, are good layers and look nice.
I saw that leghorns look nice and lay about 300 eggs per year, but can be unfriendly, what would you say? If they are raised from chicks, will they be friendly?

We bought ours 8 months ago. They were our first chickens ever. Found a great setup that someone on youtube used for the 8 weeks that they needed to be indoor and made them a great setup outside and they have been great. We ordered 6 but received 8. We have 2 golden Comets, 2 Rhode Island Reds, 2 austolorps, and 2 Buff Orphingtons. All are friendly and have been sweet. But I think it comes down to individual chickens and to the person. All of them love love love my husband (funny because he was very against getting them, said they were loud, dirty and why would we want them) and he adores them. One of the australorps and one of the comets are the closest with him, and one of the rhode island reds and the buffs are most excited to see me. The 2 that are a little more stand offish are the 2 that are at the top of the pecking order.....but still friendly. The secret seems to be if you hold them a lot from the time they are babies they will trust you...and if you continue to bring them treats as they get older and pet them a lot they love you even more.
Even though it is in the middle of the winter and we have had record cold stretches for Georgia ours have stayed happy and healthy and we get usually 7-8 eggs a day. We keep them fed and lots of water and we hung an infrared heater above their coop (our whole area is fully enclosed with hardware mesh so they don't have to sleep in their coop....they prefer to sleep on top of it) and while the area they are in doesn't get warmer the heat just reaches the top so it takes the edge off for them. We run it at night when it goes below freezing and during the day too when its below 30 and they love it. On the super cold windy days they still spend a good bit of time in the open run, getting in the sunlight but will run in and get on the coop to warm up then go back out again and at night they love it they stay right under it. So we have had no issues with they slowing of eggs in the winter.

 

[CaretakerCarol]

I don't have any mean birds, but the only breed that follows us around like puppy dogs are our Barred Rocks plus they are all superstar layers.

We have 6 silver leghorns and one of them is the meanest among our chicks that go broody. We have to wear protection to get the eggs out from under her, BUT what a great mother hen she was. Seriously, they talk about Silkies, but this girl was amazing. Even went crazy at a small hawk that perched across from her 1-week old chicks (everyone was secured in a brooding run). My problem with the leghorns is that all SCREECH when they are thinking about laying, when they want the single, occupied nest box that is the only one good enough despite the other five being empty, and when they have finished laying. Oh the noise can leave you drooling.

No more leghorns for me!

 

[ILoveDaffy]

Orpingtons and Easter Eggers! Orpingtons can come in pretty colors (Chocolate, Lavender and Jubilee are my favorites.) and lay well, the same goes for Easter Eggers. The only thing is, I've had some Easter Eggers that weren't very cuddly but had a pretty good temperment, and one that was mean, but he was a rooster. I have  never had a bad tempered Orpington. They seem to be generally kid friendly. (For reference, I've had a total of 8 Orpingtons and 5 Easter Eggers.)

 

[Kypris]

I think it would help narrow it down if you prioritized that list.

If temperament is #1, my personal favorite are real Ameraucana and English Orpington.

Many breeds are nice looking if you get good stock... so maybe look into what appearance elements you like the best.
I for one, prefer chickens that don't look like default chickens, so Leghorns were never on my list.
Yet, we ended up raising 8 Leghorns last year and did our best to socialize them without overwhelming them. They turned out to not be skittish as we had been warned, and they grew on me a bit, but they are not personable either. The consistency of lay is cool.
But I still love blue eggs the best!

So, "it depends".

I second this answer. I have a mixed flock of Ameraucanas and Orpingtons and I LOVE them. Murray McMurray hatchery is a reliable source for quality stock (I get nothing for endorsing them). I also kinda like mypetchicken.com - all my ameraucanas came from there and they are champion layers, and just so sweet. They love to be picked up and cuddled, and they are kind of quirky with their behaviors too. very smart. Orpingtons in my experience are a more laid back hen, but also lovely, they do take longer to mature though. My 3 year old Buff Orpington hen is just really coming into her own this year.

And yeah, I love the blue eggs.

Also heard good things about Welsummers and Barnevelders, but don't have personal experience with them yet.

 

[JansFlock]

Which sorts of chicken would you say have a nice temperament, are good layers and look nice.
I saw that leghorns look nice and lay about 300 eggs per year, but can be unfriendly, what would you say? If they are raised from chicks, will they be friendly?

 

[SeaCity]

Okay so they can be friendly if raised from chicks. Do you think if they grew up alongside adult quails they could learn to like them?

I heard that chickens will kill quail, so I wouldn't mix.

 

[jmendoza]

They look quite nice!

Well, as far as looks, temperament, and laying, it is hard to beat the Easter Eggers. My two "sisters" who lay green and blue eggs, have wonderful black laced plumage, are very quiet and sweet, and consistently lay over the winter months when everyone else takes a break.