Train him with bear scent instead of deer scent.

I know this sounds overly simplistic, but it is true. Many coonhounds will not run a deer. They just don't care. Some friends and I turned loose in a field one night, shined our lights and saw about 15 pairs of eyes bedded down. This coonhounds ran right through the herd and never even slowed down. If you make bear hunting fun and exciting for the dog, then deer won't matter as much.

That being said, sometimes a dog will CHASE a deer(big difference...running=tracking, chasing=wow, that thing is running and this is fun)

If you do realize that your dog is running deer, get out Mr. Tritronics and crank it up. Take the dog to a field where you know deer travel it and wait. When the deer come through, give it a few minutes and then turn your dog loose. At the first sign of the dog starting to track the deer, give him the juice. Repeat as necessary.

Normally I wouldn't recommend that you start on a high level, but running deer can be a BIG problem. First, they can get really far away, really quick. Deer travel fast and can travel long distances. Second, that deer may cross a lot of roads in an effort to outrun the dog. That means danger for old red. Finally, if old red does catch up to that deer, the deer can slash the heck out of him with it's hoofs. I've only seen one person's pictures that this has happened too, and it wasn't pretty.