TIGNISH, Prince Edward Island—In Atlantic Canada, a few millimeters of lobster shell have some people seeing red.

Fishermen in the provinces of Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick are at loggerheads over how big a lobster’s carapace must be for a lobster to be harvested. Fishermen in Prince Edward Island are fighting to keep the minimum carapace at 72 millimeters, or about 2.8 inches, while their counterparts in New Brunswick would like to see fishing restricted to lobsters with larger shell sizes—as much as 10 millimeters longer. That is .39 inch.

At stake is tiny Prince Edward Island’s lock on the global market for so-called canner lobsters, younger and smaller lobsters that are prized for their sweeter taste and sought after by major customers, including casinos and cruise ships. The lobster market is worth about 144.2 million Canadian dollars ($130 million) a year to the province, which has a population of just 145,000.

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