Three separate flocks

We now have three very distinct flocks, each in their own space.  Last week, we turned our mean rooster into sausage and stew, leaving four old hens remaining of our pre-2011 birds (three Golden Comets and one White Cochin.)  As top hens in the pecking order, they get all of the kitchen scraps along with their laying pellets, and since I rotated them back into chicken pasture 3, they've also been enjoying scratching through the aging compost pile for worms.  But I have to admit that the old girls also spend a lot of their time napping in the shade --- I think I've been feeding them too much.

Our "tweens" are the cockerels and pullets that hatched out at the end of March --- one homegrown youngster (Golden Comet X Golden Comet/Rhode Island Red hybrid) and twelve storebought Black Australorps.  Although they've taken to roosting near the old girls in the main part of the coop, the tweens are clearly at the bottom of the pecking order and aren't allowed to eat near the older flock.  As a result, the youngsters tend to stick to their own pasture (which is the over-grazed forest pasture since the old girls have decided they like the grassier pasture I newly opened), but they also slip under the gate and graze out in the woods across the driveway.  These tweens are constantly working for their dinner and rarely seem interested when I put out storebought feed, which may be why they're a bit timid around people --- what's the point of cozying up to humans when there's so much food free for the picking?

Meanwhile, our May chicks have just made the transition from the brooder to the other chicken coop, spurred on by their newfound ability to make short flights.  (I figured they'd be out of the brooder and wandering around the kitchen soon if I didn't move them.  I kept them inside longer than the last batch to protect them from rats.)  These chicks are just shy of two weeks old, and I figure within a week they'll be ready to explore the vastly overgrown chicken pasture 2, which has been fallow since the middle of March.  I'm looking forward to seeing how these Cuckoo Marans (and homegrown 3.0) compare to the Black Australorps in foraging ability.