Before we introduce you to the current MCU mascot, Powder (a cockatoo), you might be interested in this tribute to our first Poker Parrot.

Silver - the original MCU mascot.

We're sad. Pets are pets and people are people, I guess. Pets die. People get over the hurt after awhile. I've done it lots of times. But Silver was so special. And he touched many of your lives as the "Poker Parrot" - an African Grey who was the official mascot of Mike Caro University of Poker. He even had a poker book dedicated to him and made an appearance in a poker video.

I'm a skeptic. I'd always believed that many people interpreted animal behavior in a way that portrayed pets as having more human emotion and intelligence than seemed justified. But then I bought my wife Phyllis a parrot 11 years ago for our fifth anniversary. I knew little about pets and almost nothing about parrots at the time. So, it was just a happy accident that I brought home an African Grey parrot and later learned about ongoing scientific studies that ranked them among the smartest non-humans on earth. Unlike most other parrots, Greys don't just mimic words you teach them. They learn words on their own and make up sentences, which they use in context.

Silver would say to my wife, "Mommy, I want to take a shower now," or "I want my breakfast," or "I want to go upstairs now." He would never say these things at inappropriate times or just to hear himself speak. In fact, he pieced together so many sentences, I can't remember them all. But after he fell sick and lost strength two weeks ago, the only two things he could remember to say were, "I love you," and "I wanna go to sleep now."

If correctly cared for, Greys can live to be 50 to 70 years old. Nobody seems to know for sure. Although under the care of one of the best specialists in the world, Silver died peacefully at the age of just 12, on our pillow at 8 a.m., Saturday, January 29, 2000. He remains the MCU mascot. And he remains in Phyllis' heart. Mine, too.

About five months ago, Silver attended the graduation ceremonies for our MCU Introduction to Poker course at Hollywood Park. When our chief administrator, Debbie Parks, began to speak, Silver seemed shocked by the shattered silence, and shouted, "Be quiet." The room was washed in laughter. In a perverse way, this made me proud.

The above is a portion of an article that first appeared in Card Player Magazine

Introducing Powder.

Powder was born in 2000. He is an Umbrella Cockatoo his is slowly (very slowly) learning to play poker as part of his assigned duties as the new MCU mascot. We're not sure what poker terms he already knows, but for terms that he doesn't yet know, please see the MCU Official Dictionary of Poker by Michael Wiesenberg.