This study was designed to establish: a) whether boar pheromones, androstenone and androstenol, may affect the vasocontractility of the facial superficial veins in ovariectomized pubertal gilts and b) what is the effect of estradiol on this contractility. The gilts ovariectomized after two controlled estrous cycles, and the ovariectomized gilts treated with estradiol benzoate were used in the experiment. The isolated rings of dorsal nasal, frontal and facial veins were incubated with androstenone (5alpha-androst-16-en-3-one) and androstenol (5alpha-androst-16-en-3-ol) in concentrations of either 1 or 10 microM. Changes in the contractile activity of the isolated vein segments were measured using isometric transducer and recorded with HSE-ACAD W software. In ovariectomized gilts both the androstenone and androstenol caused a relaxing effect on the nasal vein, flow of the blood from the nasal cavity, and on the frontal vein, by which the blood may by directed into the perihypophyseal vascular complex. An opposing reaction to these pheromones was found in the distal part of the facial vein by which the blood is directed to the systemic circulation. Treating ovariectomized gilts with estradiol benzoate changed mainly the reactivity of the frontal vein to androstenone, which produces constriction, but this treatment did not affect the reactivity of the facial superficial veins to androstenol. The present results demonstrated that both boar sex pheromones, androstenone and androstenol, may contribute to the regulation of their humoral pathway from the nasal cavity to the brain and hypophysis in the ovariectomized pubertal gilts and suggest the effect of estradiol to this pathway.