Just over a year ago, Blu got an infection in his ankle, under the skin. At first I thought maybe he'd broken it, because it was really, really swollen, but it wasn't inflamed and I couldn't feel a break at all, and he could still move the leg. There was no entry wound at all to indicate that he'd hurt himself and let outside infection in. I lanced the bulge, and there was pus, so I took him to the vet. The lady that saw him hadn't ever dealt with peafowl before and the vet that had was on vacation. So she prescribed him some anti-biotics for him to take, hoping it would clear it up, and told me it was fine to drain out as much pus as I could. The bird vet would be back in a week, if the anti-biotics didn't work.
Well, they didn't work, and the "real" vet returned, and immediately had an x-ray done of Blu's leg. They found what seemed to be solid pieces (like of bone?) except that they were not FROM anywhere. Like, no bones were broken, no pieces missing from anywhere else, everything was intact, he just had these masses forming in his ankle. Eek! So I asked them about surgery to remove them, and he said it was going to be expensive and anesthesia and birds was always a big gamble. I told him, if Blu's willing to fight, I'm willing to pay for it, so do it. They went ahead and did the surgery (and Blu did great, he was a champ through all of this), and removed what they described as "solid packets of infection" that had "eaten into his tendons". They sent them away for analysis- and the postal service promptly lost the package and it was never recovered, so none of us have any idea what happened, or what it was, or why it happened, or if it is likely to happen again.
Blu underwent some amount of physical therapy to keep the motion he had left in the leg. He can't spread his toes anymore to stand on them, and his leg will not extend straight anymore, but he can pull it all the way up to his body. The infection cleared up immediately and his ankle returned to normal size and shape.
