Puff-shroom

The Puff-shroom is the first mushroom you get, and, although it has an incredibly short range, is free - a good trade-off, since sun is harder to come by at night. They are nearly as effective as Peashooters, but only have a 3 column shooting range. Of course, as a mushroom, they are only awake at night, and their bad range makes the expense of waking them up with a Coffee Bean a waste of sun.

Suburban Almanac Entry
Puff-shroom

Puff-shrooms are cheap, but can only fire a short distance.

Damage: normal

Range: short

Sleeps during the day

"I only recently became aware of the existence of zombies,"says Puff-shroom."Like many other fungi, I'd just assumed they were fairy tales or movie monsters. This whole experience has been a huge eye-opener for me."

Cost: 0

Recharge: fast

Strategy
Because of their short range, they can only handle basic zombies, unless used in multiple columns, so more effective plants should be added to your defenses mid-level. Another strategy is to fill the stage from column four over, and replace the back ones when you can. These plants can also be used to slow Gargantuars and Giga-Gargantuars in Survival: Endless, due to the free cost allowing players to sacrifice them to force the Gargantuars to stop to smash them. Puff-shrooms work well in conjunction with defensive plants as the Puff-shroom has plenty of time to fire at the zombie before getting eaten. These may also be helpful in ZomBotany and ZomBotany 2, as they are too short for the zombies to hit them with peas, making them a good choice for both attacking and stopping Squash Zombies. However, they need Coffee Beans to be waken up.

One of the most well-balanced defenses for the night levels uses two columns of Puff-shrooms (in columns 3 and 4 from the right, although a third can be added in column two) behind which one or two columns of Fume-shooms are planted. Behind these are planted two rows of Scaredy-shrooms for long range attacking, with a row of Sun-shrooms to produce sun.

Trivia

 * The Puff-shroom, Sun-shroom, and Potato Mine are the only plants that can avoid the peas of the Peashooter Zombie and the Gatling Pea Zombie.
 * However, if they are planted on Flower Pots, the Puff-shroom can be hit by the Peashooter Zombies' and Gatling Pea Zombies' peas due to the added height of the Flower Pot.
 * This does not happen is if you plant it on a Lily Pad.
 * The Puff-shroom has a 3 square range, since it's enough to kill a normal zombie.
 * The Puff-shroom and the Sea-shroom are the only plants in the game that cost no sun.
 * A Puff-shroom is too small for a Pumpkin, but when it shoots a spore, the spore passes through the Pumpkin's shell and still damages the zombies.
 * The Puff-shroom is the smallest plant in the game, apart from the Potato Mine when it is unarmed.
 * The Puff-shroom and the Sun-shroom are the only plants which, when planted, may not be in the centre of a square on the lawn. They may get planted slightly to the left or right.
 * The Puff-shroom, the Fume-shroom, the Gloom-shroom, and the Sea-shroom are the only short-ranged shooters.