Established hens not letting new hens eat

[gophert]

I have two elderly Barred Rocks (5+ years) and recently brought home 2 Ameracauna/Buff Orp hens who are about 4 months old. We introduced them at night by putting them up to roost together. During the day I let them out to range in my yard and don't see any problems...in fact, the new girls often hang out pretty near the old and all seems peaceful. However, the problem is feeding time. I have always fed in the coop, and I do not use a feeder due to rats and squirrels. I have a Catawba style coop, like this only I think a little bigger (I did not build it--it was given to us):

http://media.adamziegler.com/chickens/Coop/7_3-7_coop.jpg

What happens is that the new girls come down to eat and immediately get chased up the ramp by the old girls. To deal with this problem, I open up the coop and the old girls will go out into the yard and let the new ones have their share. However, this is not a long term solution because we have always had days when we leave the chickens in the coop so we don't have to get home in time to put them inside. I want to be able to feed all the chickens in the coop together. Any help? Will this happen naturally as my new girls get bigger? They are still much smaller than the fat old birds. We are not handy and have a small urban yard that cannot be taken up by a secure enclosed run (I have kids as well) so I don't want to construct anything like that if at all possible. However, I am worried about my little girls. They really don'ty even come down the ramp in the morning till the big girls are out of the coop. This would be a big problem once it heats up, if I am not here to let them out. The funny thing is, we had them all in the bottom (with the ramp pulled up) a few times at the beginning and while there was some chasing, I did not see any serious aggression. Just standard mild pecks.

 

[chooks4life]

It may calm down as they grow bigger, or it may escalate and the tables may be turned on the older girls. If possible making a second (and even third and fourth if necessary) food source available is one simple way to defuse this problem. They would need to be as far away from one another as possible so your older hens cannot control every single food source. It can help to have barriers set up to stop chasing or stop any one hen from controlling any one food source.

Best wishes.

 

[gophert]

Yes, what I do is scatter the feed in all 4 corners of the coop so the big hens can't guard it all at once. It doesn't seem to help, because the bigs harass the littles when they come down the ramp and the littles run up the ramp again. Is there any sense in trying to somehow scold or discipline my big hens?? That seems kind of nuts, although I do of course have the instinct (I'm a mom--what can I say?) I just need them all to be able to coexist in the bottom of that coop and eat and get air and water sometimes. It doesn't happen that much, but we do have to be gone all day occasionally.