Trouble with transferring new domain zone file to seconadry names erver

[Belknap, Christopher]

I have created a new zone file on the primary nameserver that will server as
the authoritative answer for the new domain. I need to transfer this new
zone to a secondary nameserver. I checked the serial number on the zone file
and it is fine, and I am able to resolve the new domain's hosts from the
primary nameserver. But, when I try to transfer the domain to the secondary
nameserver manually using named-xfer, I cannot resolve any of the nwe hosts
on the secondary nameserver. Here is a line of output from the
/var/adm/messages file of the primary nameserver:

Feb  4 17:00:27 gatekeeper named-xfer[5613]: no SOA found for ross.wmg.com,
SOA query got rcode 3, aa 1, ancount 0, aucount 1

What is wrong here? I am a little new to DNS, so I know enough to be
dangerous. Do I need to put a copy of the zone file locally on the secondary
name server before I do the named-xfer? This new domain and zone file are
brand new, so the secondary nameserver knows nothing about it. Thank you for
any help you can provide.