Without opening the devices, at least 100 spores (20e25 per microscopic field) were examined through the Petri dish lid every hour. Experiments were carried out in triplicate. The length of the germ tubes was measured by means of a Leica DMLB (_200) (Leica, Rueil- Malmaison, France) connected to a IXC 800 (I2S, Pessac, France) camera. Pictures were analyzed using Matrox Inspector 2.2 (Matrox Electronics Systems Ltd, Dorval, Canada). Spores were considered germinated when the length of the germ tubes was greater to equal the greatest dimension of the swollen spore .