A Tenants Harbor lobsterman has donated a rare yellow lobster to the University of New England’s Marine Science Center in Biddeford.

The New England Aquarium says only one in about 30 million lobsters have yellow shells. Banana is one of them.  Courtesy University of New England

The lobster, which has been named Banana, was donated by Marley Babb, a Tenants Harbor lobsterman, who caught the crustacean, UNE said in a news release.

Babb initially contacted the Maine Department of Marine Resources. DMR’s Jessica Waller, who is working on a lobster research project with UNE’s Markus Frederich, arranged to have the lobster delivered to the university’s Biddeford campus. The New England Aquarium said wild lobsters with yellow shells are extremely rare – only one in about 30 million.

The UNE is sharing an $860,000 grant from the National Science Foundation with the Maine Department of Marine Resources, the Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences, and Hood College in Maryland to study the impact that a warming Gulf of Maine is having on lobster larvae and their ability to grow to adulthood.