holly-leaf cherry
- noun
- US
:
cereza de hoja de acebo
- She planted a holly-leaf cherry in her garden for its attractive foliage and flowers.
Examples
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The holly-leaf cherry thrives in the chaparral regions of California.
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Birds are often attracted to the fruit of the holly-leaf cherry in late summer.
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Look at the holly-leaf cherry!
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The holly-leaf cherry blooms beautifully in the spring.
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Birds are often attracted to the fruit of the holly-leaf cherry in late summer.
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She planted a holly-leaf cherry in her garden for its attractive foliage and flowers.
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The holly-leaf cherry thrives in the chaparral regions of California.
Synonyms
An evergreen shrub or small tree with spiny leathery leaves and white flowers from California
An evergreen bush or small tree with spiny thick leaves and edible fruit like a small plum
An evergreen shrub or small tree from Catalina Island that produces small dark red edible fruit
Surface Forms
Morphology
holly-leaf + cherry
The phrase denotes a cherry (tree/shrub) characterized by leaves like those of holly, so its meaning is directly derivable from combining 'holly' + 'leaf' as a modifier with 'cherry'. This descriptive, compositional pattern is common and cross-linguistically transparent, so a B1 learner who knows the constituent words would readily infer the meaning.
Etymology
Holly-leaf cherry: The name comes from how the plant looks. Its spiny, leathery leaves are like holly and it has small red fruit like a cherry, so people joined those two images to name the 'plant'.
