There may not be too many symbols in the base game, but this shouldn't let anyone leave because it just leaves more room for a bunch of bonus icons, such as wild, scattered or even jackpot symbols.
When the cherry tree simply stops at any location, it can reward multiples of the total bet without having to cross the defined payline. If there are 3 cherry scatters, a bonus of 5 times the trigger bet will be paid, and 4 rewards will be 25x. The best result is 5 spread bets because the punter gets a bonus equal to 100 times the total bet.