Fire Piranha Plant

A Venus Fire Trap ("Fire Pakkun" in Japan) is a variety of Piranha Plant that shoots fireballs in Mario's direction. They can be either green or red and appear in Super Mario Bros. 3, Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins and New Super Mario Bros.

Venus Fire Traps made several appearances in The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3. Piranha Plants with fireball exhaling abilities similar to Venus Fire Traps also appeared in The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! though referred to as a Magic Piranha Plant.

In the Nintendo Comics System story "The Fish That Should've Gotten Away", a giant Venus Fire Trap, green in color, appears among the large group of monsters attacking and chasing Mario.

They also appear rarely in Super Mario 64 in Tiny-Huge Island and Bowser in the Sky, where they are drastically smaller than their previous appearances. They would attack by appearing suddenly, then blasting a small fireball before disappearing. They were easy to defeat if Mario punches one, where it would simply pop and leave a coin behind. Larger versions appeared in the same game where they were just as large as Super Piranha Plants. They attacked the same and could be defeated with a single punch.

Trivia

 * Venus Fire Trap is a play on the name of a real life carnivorous plant, the Venus Flytrap.
 * They attack similarily like the Elasto-Piranha. In fact the Elasto- Piranha could just be an evolved species of the Venus Fire Trap as the Elasto-Piranha can stretch its neck and has arms and legs, making it more tougher than the V.F.T.
 * In the game Ultimate Ghosts 'n Goblins for Sony PlayStation Portable, a Piranha plant-like creature appears that spits fireballs much like a Venus Fire Trap.