diff --git a/hbase-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/util/Bytes.java b/hbase-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/util/Bytes.java
index 30fa08bb604..edd75a90388 100644
--- a/hbase-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/util/Bytes.java
+++ b/hbase-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/util/Bytes.java
@@ -1404,7 +1404,7 @@ public class Bytes {
       throw new IllegalArgumentException("b <= a");
     }
     if (num <= 0) {
-      throw new IllegalArgumentException("num cannot be < 0");
+      throw new IllegalArgumentException("num cannot be <= 0");
     }
     byte [] prependHeader = {1, 0};
     final BigInteger startBI = new BigInteger(add(prependHeader, aPadded));