Ok,
I' m now in my second season of Deer hunting and I have learned so much but I' m not quite where I need to be. Last year I had a buddy who is an excellent bow hunter set me up in a spot and I got my first deer. This is after going 0-23 for SIGHTINGS picking my own spots. All my spots were near scrapes, rubs, hair on fences etc etc. I am the master at finding sign but I can' t find the darn deer LOL!

The only time I have seen anything this year was in the spot he helped me find.

I can' t figure out just what I am missing.

I can now walk a piece of woods and spot tracks with relative ease. For example I went out on a new too me hunting spot where I spotted tracks crossing the logging trail I was on, and then I noticed tracks at both of the far corners of a cleared farming field. I followed one of the corners in and found where there were a few deer tracks crossing a small brook about 100 yard in from the corner of the field. While in my stand I noticed another tree stand roughly 50 yards from mine. I saw nothing.

IMO my problem seems to be finding where deer travel all the time vs. where deer travel SOME of the time. It is very frustrating since I know what they eat, I have an idea that they are in the swampy area off the fields but I can NEVER seem to find the right spots to set up.

My buddy sees a deer at least 75-80% of the time while my ratio is more like 50-10%. I' m not looking to bag a deer everytime but just seeing a deer makes any hunt exciting.

What am I missing? What are better hunters seeing that I don' t see?