Jas, so many times I have walked onto ground with farmers who have lived there since birth for over 60 years telling me they never see deer on their land. I then go down for a look and the place has signs of deer to high stink. I call it the fox theory.
When was the last time you saw a fox on the ground you shoot that wasn't picked up on the lamp. I am on a small farm where the signs of foxes and badger are everywhere, definitely evident with a bit of snow............but unless I go out at 12 at night with a lamp and red filter I never see them.
In fact over the past 6 months I have pushed that fox out of cover with the dogs, he took a deer head on me a month back, and even opened up a new den on one of the nearby hills but this fox must be a relative of Houdini!
On saying that, I have the privilege of being a member for a club with 1000acres on the Lough Neagh shore line and I can say hand on my heart there are absolutely no deer present. Plenty of badgers and foxes that are decimating the ducks but no deer. I have stalked all that cover for the past 20 years as a child with a .410 to present with the rifle and not one deer to be seen.
Seeing deer on ground known as good for stalking is hard enough, but to be in the right place at the right time for transient deer is so much harder!