diff --git a/.travis.yml b/.travis.yml
index 728f0e248..3cab77ce4 100644
--- a/.travis.yml
+++ b/.travis.yml
@@ -71,6 +71,13 @@ matrix:
 
 install:
   - pip install tox
+  
+  # if we don't have python3.6 in this environment, travis unhelpfully gives us
+  # a `python3.6` on our path which does nothing but spit out a warning. Tox
+  # tries to run it (even if we're not running a py36 env), so the build logs
+  # then have warnings which look like errors. To reduce the noise, remove the
+  # non-functional python3.6.
+  - ( ! command -v python3.6 || python3.6 --version ) &>/dev/null || rm -f $(command -v python3.6)
 
 script:
   - tox -e $TOX_ENV
diff --git a/changelog.d/4377.misc b/changelog.d/4377.misc
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..06273023f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/changelog.d/4377.misc
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+Silence travis-ci build warnings by removing non-functional python3.6
\ No newline at end of file