Snake: Hello, I’m a Coral Snake.

Me: No, you’re not.

Snake: Yeah, I definitely am.

Me: Nope. Sorry, you’re full of it mate. Nice try.

Snake: It’s true. I’m the Ribbon Coral Snake, one of the most venomous snakes in South America. My venom is neurotoxic and mytotoxic. I can paralyse your respiratory muscles and kill you through suffocation. You’d better stay back, or I’ll bite you.

Me: Okay, look. Cut the crap. You’re a False Coral Snake, specifically Tschudi’s False Coral Snake.  Your head is completely black, and your stripes don’t even continue all the way down your body. You’re not fooling anyone.

Snake: I… ummm… painted over them, to trick you.

Me: Also your eyes are too big.

Snake: YOUR eyes are too big! *slithers away sulkingly*

The name ‘False Coral Snake’ can refer to a range of snakes, primarily Colubrids, found throughout the Americas. These snakes are typically harmless to humans, but closely resemble the often highly venomous Coral Snakes, which are decidedly not harmless to humans.

This particular snake is Tschudi’s False Coral Snake, a gorgeous snake found commonly across the Amazon Basin. Interestingly, it displays highly variable scale patterns, from a single set of bands like this one, to several or none at all – and some individuals are even predominantly black!

Disclaimer: I’m sure you wont, but please don’t use any of the information in this post to identify snakes yourself. I only got so close to this snake because an experienced guide identified it for me. Additionally, the popular phrase ‘red to black, venom lack; red to yellow, kill a fellow’ is used to differentiate between Coral Snakes and their harmless look-alikes in the US. Anywhere south of the Mexican border, that rule can get you killed (the Ribbon Coral Snake mentioned above is a good example of this). And as always with any snake – if you leave it alone, it will leave you alone.

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Tschudi’s False Coral Snake (Oxyrhopus melanogenys), Los Amigos Biological Station, Madre de Dios, Peru