If you’re lucky enough to live in an area that’s home to different wildlife, you’re also unlucky enough to potentially play ‘host’ to many of these critters:  raccoons, opossums, squirrels, mice and rats.  If it’s small enough to sneak around and in your home, it’s probably going to want to ‘shack up’ there.

Wildlife tends to stay within the vicinity of your home if it finds a reason to stay.  Most of the time, those ‘reasons’ involve finding conveniences that give them access to cleaner water, food and shelter.

Below is a list of 5 conditions around your home that wildlife look for:

Condition #1: A path to warmth.

Small critters like squirrels and rats will find their way into your home, if they can find a path that will lead them to the warm shelter inside. Unchecked points of entry around the exterior of your home, including nearby upper floors like the attic, are common places for these critters to enter.

Condition #2: A path to food and water.

If they happen to find food in or around your home, many small critters will help themselves and find a  way towards your kitchen’s pantry and the like. If you have a garden, they’ll park themselves there, too—and won’t bother leaving as long as they can feast on your plants.

Condition #3: An invitation for wildlife to stay.

There’s a reason why people say to not interact with wild animals. Interacting with them will only aggravate them further, and even make them stay longer around the vicinity of your home.  In fact, if they can find a place to hide and a way to access both food and water, they won’t find any reason to leave.

Condition #4: Easy access points.

Around the home, there are access points for critters that you probably don’t know about. And, since many of these critters often chew and claw their way inside, they can be anywhere they want to enter.  Of course, these places are usually places where they can easily get past the existing barrier, making it that much more tricky to stop it from happening.

Condition #5: Leaving windows and doors open entice wildlife.

Like easy access points, many wild critters will feel ‘welcome’ if you make it easy for them to slip inside. When this happens, small pests like various insects and even small critters will see an open opportunity to slip inside, and take advantage of the open entryway.