Musa (AAA group) ‘Dwarf Cavendish’ several un-named clones
Musa (AAB group) ‘Aea’e’ = Musa (AAB group) ‘Koa’e’
Musa (AAB group) ‘Vittata’
Musa (AAB group) ‘Banane panachee’
Musa (AAB group) ‘Anil Vazhai’ or ‘Variegated French Plantain’

Musa basjoo 'Variegata' is mentioned in several books including those cited above.   No doubt the plant existed in the past but, at the time the books cited above were written, I believe the plant had been lost to cultivation and that none of the authors had actually seen it.

However, there are now a few plants of Musa basjoo 'Variegata' in existance.  How has this come about?

Variegated plants arise periodically when any plant is propagated.  If a variegated plant arises as a sport on a previously non-variegated plant it is almost always a chimera and this is the case in Musa basjoo.  The variegated plant arises as a bud sport on the main plant through a mutation affecting chlorophyll production in a single cell in a shoot meristem which is eventually manifest in the plant itself.  Roughly speaking bud sports occur at the rate of 1 in 10,000.  The greater the number of plants propagated the greater the chance of a sport occuring.  Bananas, among plants in general, are particularly prone to throwing bud sports and this process seems to be further accentuated when bananas are micropropagated.  It is very common to see abnormal plants in a population of micropropagated bananas, perhaps 1 in 2,000 or even more frequently if cultures are badly managed.  Most abnormalities are unattractive and, if plants do not spontaneously die, plants are simply thrown away.

With the growing market for plants for tropical effect in the garden, more and more plants of Musa basjoo are being micropropagated.  It was inevitable that sports would occur as a result of this and some of these would be attractive variegated plants.  Variegated plants of Musa basjoo have been found in batches of micropropagated plants in Holland and in the UK and no doubt elsewhere too.  Thus, Musa basjoo 'Variegata' has been re-borne having previously been lost to cultivation.

But has Musa basjoo 'Variegata' really be re-borne?  One or two variegated plants in a batch of micropropagated plants do not a cultivar make!  It is rather common to find variegated plants in batches of micropropagated bananas but not easy to propagate them.  Chimeras tend to be rather unstable and either revert back to the normal green form (common) or become completely white or yellow (uncommon).  This instability makes it difficult to propagate variegated bananas even by conventional suckers.  This is the main reason that plants of the most famous variegated banana, 'Aea'e' or 'Ae Ae', are so rarely found and so expensive.  The instability tends to greater in tissue culture, which more or less precludes micropropagation from being used for variegated bananas.

As more and more plants of Musa basjoo and other bananas are produced through micropropagation it is inevitable that more and more variegated forms will emerge.  Some will be green/yellow, some green/white and some green/yellow/white.  Whether any of these will be sufficiently stable to be propagated and released as commercial cultivars remains to be seen.

Images

Images of Musa basjoo 'Variegata' coming soon