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Paradise tree snake

The Observer

|

July 06, 2025

Never underestimate a snake. I know we're long, and everything else that flies or glides is essentially wide, but us lot, us Chrysopelea, we've cracked it too. Flying squirrels, flying lizards, flying frogs - I'd back myself to out-glide any one of them.

- As told to Simon Barnes

Monday

You'd probably call me a poisonous snake, but I'm not really. I'm venomous ma non troppo. I've got enough venom for a lizard or a rodent, but not enough to trouble a human, even if one should dare to join us in the forest canopy. Hot wet Asian jungles are full of life and therefore full of death. Which reminds me: I'm hungry.

Tuesday

I'm a great climber. Not fast but very sure. But there's an issue all tree-dwellers must face: how do you get to the next tree? Especially when the tree you want to get to isn't very close to the tree you're in. You could cross along the ground and expose yourself to every predator in the jungle. Or you could do what we do.

Wednesday

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