We have 3. Nothing special just general brown farm chooks.
We pay £7 for a bag of layers pellets, it lasts for 6-8 weeks also. But for treats we give them a bit of mixed corn once or twice a week, plus greens and scraps from the kitchen, the especially like cooked spud peelings (don't give raw though as there too much starch). The pellets also contain grit which they need. We have the food in a 10kg treadle operated hopper to keep the mice & rats out. We have a 20l water container so there's always clean water for them.
Their fav thing is oats in natural yoghurt.
Chooks naturally lay 1 egg every 23 hours, but can sometimes miss a day. Unlike what some people believe you do not need a cock for them to lay eggs, unless you want to breed them.
We have a coop we bought from ebay and a 4m x 3m x 2m run placed straight on the garden, it has a roof on so it doesn't get too soggy. We also let them roam the garden most days.
In the run we spread a bag of chippings every year, and use straw (dont use hay) in the coop. 1 bail of straw will last ages, we've had these chooks for 2 years and haven't reached halfway through the bail yet.
I thought about making a solid base for the run but apparently they don't like it as it gives them nothing to scratch about in, they are natural foragers and like to dig and scratch the ground looking for food. A solid base just under the coop would be ok though.
Chicken shit is great fertiliser but don't put it straight on your plants as it's too rich, it can burn the roots, it needs to mulch down a bit first.
There was no problems in the 2 winters we've had the girls, they just scratch through the snow to get at what's underneath.
When we go on holiday it costs a fortune to put the cats in a cattery, but the chooks we leave where they are, the food hopper has around a months worth of food and same for the water, we just tell our neighbour to collect the eggs.
If you are in the Wigan area you can get hens from Lucky Hens Rescue, and they have lots of good advice and tips on their website, especially about the various diseases.
We treat ours more like pets than egg laying machines, so the cost is really irrelevant, after all we paid over £800 for the cats and they cost us a fortune in food and give nothing in return.
Lucky Hens Rescue – Wigan