Recently I discovered that 4 of my young Mini Monstera leaves have patches of colour on them. Could this be variegation, and if so is it rare/worth anything?

Very cute plant

Hard to tell, very familiar with monsteras but not variegated varieties.

That said, I'd lean towards a watering/lighting/nutrient issue (sorry, I could very well be wrong).

Is it on both sides of the leaves?

Humboldt said:
That said, I'd lean towards a watering/lighting/nutrient issue (sorry, I could very well be wrong).

Is it on both sides of the leaves?

Ah, that would make sense probably. No, the undersides of the leaves appear normal. No discolouration there, I don't think but I could be wrong.

Looks like a relatively new purchase?

If so just keep an eye on it, might take a while to adjust to new conditions and grow out of its old ones.

Couple of weeks old, but repotted yesterday around midday so that I could fit the climbing frame. That could be the source of the problem maybe, but I'll keep an eye on it for the next few weeks. Thank you

Looks like a small amount of transient true variegation. If the 'stripe' doesn't also appear on the meristem and petiole, the variegation did not go through enough cell layers to be considered true. It may recur once in a while, but, it probably will never turn into a highly variegated plant, maybe a patch here and there

Gina1960 said: Looks like a small amount of transient true variegation. If the 'stripe' doesn't also appear on the meristem and petiole, the variegation did not go through enough cell layers to be considered true. It may recur once in a while, but, it probably will never turn into a highly variegated plant, maybe a patch here and there

That's what I was waiting for, thank you.

Gina1960 said: Looks like a small amount of transient true variegation. If the 'stripe' doesn't also appear on the meristem and petiole, the variegation did not go through enough cell layers to be considered true. It may recur once in a while, but, it probably will never turn into a highly variegated plant, maybe a patch here and there

Sounds interesting, I'll keep an eye on it and hope for the best. Will the leaves ever revert back to green? If the variegation returns in the future, will any of the leaves ever contain white or only shades of green and yellow? There is a bit of white where the leaf joins the stem, but I think that's just natural.
Thank you for this information, I really appreciate it, though it is all new to me so I'll have to do a bit of research on terms and genetics. Best of luck to all of you with your own plants

Variegation is a many faceted thing. There are different types of variegation, but this is chimeric variegation meaning there was a spontaneous mutation that occurred. Chimeric variegation has many forms and can be stable or unstable. Since the mutation has to occur in meristem tissue (the root tissue and the true stem tissue) and be translated out through the rest of the plant (petioles, leaf blades) the extent of the mutation determines how it translates.





Highly variegated plants like the ones above will have a high degree of mutation that translates through many cell layers. The more times the mutation 'goes all the way through' more complete cell layers, the more spots, streaks, and patches a plant will exhibit.
The heaves that are already patterned will not turn back green. But you may never get another variegated leaf, or you may get one every once in a while, or you may get them in successive spurts.