Hollyleaf cherry

Prunus ilicifolia, the hollyleaf cherry or islay, is an evergreen shrub or small tree native to the chaparral and coastal sage scrub of California and Baja California, including a distinctive subspecies endemic to the Channel Islands. It typically grows 3-8 m tall, with smooth grey bark and dense, rounded crowns of stiff, glossy, dark-green leaves. The leaves resemble those of a holly: thick and leathery, oval to nearly round, 2-5 cm long, with spiny-toothed margins. In spring the plant produces small white five-petalled flowers in slender axillary racemes 4-8 cm long, pleasantly fragrant and attractive to many insects. The fruit is a globose drupe 12-20 mm across that ripens dark red to purplish-black in late summer and autumn; it has a thin, slightly sweet flesh surrounding a large stone whose kernel, like other Prunus seeds, contains cyanogenic glycosides and must be processed before being eaten.