Introduction problems

[Jins]

Hi all. We've had chickens for 3 years now, we started off with four Warrens. Two remain and they are tottering round looking old and tatty and absolutely adorable. We bought three more Warrens in the spring and have now added three 21 week old Novo browns to the coop.

Introducing the second batch of warrens was a bit tricky but they settled down as soon as laying started. This time round is proving much harder and the two younger warrens are being absolutely vile to the novos, one of whom has started laying.

I'm separating them during the day as much as possible and there's no trouble in the coop at night but now I'm wondering if the separation is adding to the problems because the pecking order battle starts up again as soon as they mix again. No serious injuries so far, it's all a bit 'handbags' at the moment

Should I just leave them all together and let them sort it out. I feel so sorry for the babies :(

[redrighthand]

They will get there in the end definitely although it's important to make sure the newbies get enough food & water, they need to sort out their new social hierarchy.