Experimental infections together with epidemiological studies have shown that pathogenic and non‐pathogenic isolates of V. nigripulchritudo co‐existed in shrimp farm environment (2, 3). Moreover, obtained results also demonstrated that the “summer syndrome”was caused by a single, possibly emerging, cluster of virulent strains. Consequently, it was hypothesized that pathogenic strains of V. nigripulchritudo may persist from one year to the next in the shrimp farm environment and re‐develop inside the grow‐out system at the following rearing cycle (3). This study was therefore aimed at determining whether V. nigripulchritudo isolates may survive, or not, in a shrimp pond bottom soil during a 18‐week drying period. To this end, V.nigripulchritudo mapping was performed with recently developed molecular tools and classical culture‐dependent techniques.