Hailey Galyon

I am from Alexandria, VA, however, I was raised in a military household and moved around quite a bit. Because of this, I had no experience with livestock before coming to Virginia Tech for my BS in Dairy Science. Though I originally planned to be a companion animal veterinarian, I fell in love with dairy cattle and research in my undergraduate years. After graduating in 2020, I joined Dr. Cockrum's Dairy Genetics laboratory for a MS.

My Master's work was evaluating the ruminal degradation of biodegradable polymers for the safe ingestion and degradation of these materials should they be developed into net wrap applications. During my master's, I quickly became fascinated with dairy nutrition and ruminal kinetics after collaborating with Dr. Ferreira on a project with brown midrib forages.

After receiving my MS in Dairy Science from Virginia Tech in 2022, I joined Dr. Ferreira's Dairy Nutrition laboratory and I am currently a PhD student. I am evaluating the relationship between the ruminal degradation rate and ruminal passage rate of various fibers and how they relate to the total tract digestibility of the diet as well as methane emissions. My hope is to help develop more accurate databases regarding forage quality as it may largely impact the nutritional quality of the diet and its availability to the animal.