of diverse porcine organ systems to their human analogues, the pig ' s usefulness as an osteologic model species is still not entirely clear. However, even though porcine femoral compact bone is predominantly plexiforme, it is converted to well-developed osteonal bone earlier than in sheep [3] . Peak bone mass is obtained with an age of 2 -3 years. The main body of investigations in this area of research was performed using growing minipigs, which, however, might not appropriately refl ect the situation of the postmenopausal osteoporotic woman due to their juvenile age and dwarfi sm. On the other hand, minipigs achieve sexual maturity earlier than conventional pigs and thus OVX may induce the desired phenotype earlier than in conventional sows. OVX in 10 months old minipigs resulted in a 6 % decrease in bone mineral density (BMD), 15 % in bone volume (BV), and 13 % in trabecular number, and an increase of 15 % in trabecular separation after 6 months, whereas OVX in combination with a mild nutritive calcium shortage (0.75 % Ca 2 + ), which had been started already at
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