LEWISTON – George Gendron has been around a long time. He knows you don’t cook, eat or otherwise offend an orange lobster if one comes your way. That would be bad juju.

“As a matter of fact,” Gendron said, “there’s an old wives’ tale that says if a lobsterman catches an orange lobster and doesn’t throw him back, he’ll have bad luck for the rest of the season.”

Pity the unnamed lobsterman who snagged the orange crustacean earlier this week around Bailey’s Island. Gendron found the rare creature on Tuesday as he was going through a crate of 1,500 pounds of lobster at Gendron’s Seafood on Lisbon Street.

How rare is it?

“I would say one in 2-plus million,” said Gendron, who knows a thing or two about sea creatures.

The facts are these: The orange lobster weighs 1 1/3 pounds. A pound of lobster weight is equivalent to six years, which would make this one 9 years old. That’s youthful, as lobsters go.

The creature is also left-handed, which is not so rare.

How can you tell?

“When the crusher claw is on the left side,” Gendron said, “it’s a left-handed lobster.”

For those keeping score, that’s a 9-year-old, left-handed, pound-and-a-third orange lobster that should have been released to the sea the moment it was discovered in a trap.

But Gendron is happy to have it. Once he spotted it among the more mundane lobsters, he immediately contacted the Maine State Aquarium in Boothbay Harbor.

“I’ve given them three or four lobsters over the years,” Gendron said.

Indeed, he has handed over rarities such as the blue lobster and the even more extraordinary calico. A calico lobster – an odd mix of yellow, orange and greenish-brown – is considered a one-in-10-million find.

What happens is this: Lobsters generally have three pigments in their shells: blue, red and yellow. Take away the blue and there you have it, a lobster the color of a ripe pumpkin.

Gendron probably doesn’t need a lot of superstition to ensure robust business in coming days. On Father’s Day, he expects to sell 3,500 pounds of lobster. In the meantime, the orange lobster will have a home at Gendron’s until it is time to move on to the bigger stage at the museum.

“We’ll keep it here for a couple weeks,” Gendron said, “just to show him off to anyone who comes here and wants to see him.”

You can look, in other words, but keep your bib and butter away from the orange guy.