If you can, barnvelders are a great chook breed, they aren't loud, and they are really pretty to look at too. Very friendly - we have 4 of them. As for noise, well, some chooks are louder than others, just their personality! We have araucanas as well (lavender) and they seem to be louder, although smaller?

Barnvelders lay large chocolate coloured eggs with brown spots which look really funky, and the araucanas lay blue eggs which are a bit smaller.

The younger the chook, the easier to make them tame, but the longer to wait for them to get to point-of-lay. And during that time you're still paying for feed etc.

Keep in mind you get about 6 eggs / week per chook, so consider how many eggs you eat a week! We give our spare eggs to our labrador! BTW, the worst problem we have with the lab is her stealing eggs, we've caught her a few times with an egg in her mouth! And we keep our cats in the chook run during summer, the cats are scared of the chooks.

Our 3.5yr old has daily chores of feeding the chooks and collecting eggs. When he falls over in the yard, we have to give him a "chicken cuddle".