My chickens meet like this:
babies in the tractor, adults free range. After a few weeks of seeing each other and the kids learning where their "home" is and when the babies are big enough which I approximate about 6-7 weeks old, the babies get to free range with the adults. I don't get out to let them out of the coops until about 9.30ish in the morning and they are still not good locked in closed quarters together, so they each return to their separate houses for nighttime lockdown.
Mainly, the youngins can't be free ranged until they are adjusted enough to put themselves back in the tractor at night, because I'm not home till after dark. They would survive the adults earlier than I let them range, but the very first time I let them out they couldn't find their bed, so I left them in the tractor for a couple more weeks.
It might seem complicated in print, but really it's not. Every morning I let the babies out, fill the feeders/waterers, then let the adults out, and leave for work. Every night I come home and everyone is in their own roosting place when I collect the eggs and lock the doors back.
Eventually everyone will move to the main coop, but I doubt that will happen until I process the 4 extra cockerels. 5 roos enclosed with 8 pullets seems like a recipe for disaster
