Buying Poultry
Buy poultry from a reputable breeder. Buying from an auction will probably get you a heap of grief, unless you know what you are doing. The magazine, Country Smallholding has lists of breeders of poultry and other similar magazines also have lists of suppliers. Your local press might also be worth a look, especially if you live in a rural area. Most breeders will be happy for you to visit first to take a look at some hens and to get a feel for the different breeds. If you are unsure about anything just ask - a good breeder will be happy to answer your questions and to give advice.
Hens start to lay at about 20-22 weeks old, so the easiest way to start out is to buy point of lay (POL) pullets. A POL pullet is a young hen about 4-5months old that is just starting to lay for the first time. These are easy to keep, you'll get pretty instant eggs and you don't have any cockerels to deal with because by hat age, the two sexes are quite distinct.
You can buy day old chicks, but the level of stockmanship required is quite high or certainly higher than buying POL. You will need a heat lamp or brooder and specialist feed. You will also, unless you are very lucky or the breed you choose is sex-linked, have a mix of hens and cockerels. If you don't want to raise cockerels for the table, then you have a dilemma in getting rid of them.
You can buy fertilised eggs and hatch your own but, again, you'll need some specialised equipment such as an incubator and a brooder, if you don't have a broody hen, and you'll have to wait 5 months or so for your first egg. The same issue around cockerels exists with fertilised eggs as it does with day-olds.
If you have a battery farm nearby, you might want to try to get some spent layers from there. The output might be a bit unreliable at first but you will certainly have the satisfaction of giving some birds a happy "retirement". The Battery Hen Welfare Trust may be able to help if you fancy doing this.
You will need a secure, comfortable means of transporting your new hens to their new home. We use a large puppy crate and line it with straw or shredded newspaper. A cat carry box is also useful. Alternatively a sturdy cardboard box with a similar lining will do the job. Try to make sure the base is fairly non-slip, so leg damage is minimised.
If you are bringing new hens into an established flock, keep then separate for a week or so to make sure they are healthy.
We've found that the best way to introduce new hens is to put the new hens in a run near the existing flock and corn them together so they can see each other but are not in physical contact. Do this for a week or so. We then put the new hens into the roosting area with the old ones at night - the idea being that when they all come down in the morning, the old hens don't realise that there are new hens in the flock. It seems to work for us, but our hens free range, so bullying isn't a problem - any nonsense and the "victim" just legs it to another part of the field.