Without regular and diligent cleaning, your wonderful new meerschaum will become a soggy, ill-tasting mess, and will no longer provide you with the smoking pleasure you desire. To eliminate such problems, you need to embark on a regimen of regular cleaning and maintainance for your meerschaums.

Materials Needed:

• Tapered Pipe Cleaners
• Bristle Pipe Cleaners
• Regular or extra fluffy pipe cleaners
• shank brush or cotton swab
• pipe tool or pick

Concerning 'Coloring':
One of the joys of owning and smoking a meerschaum pipe is watching it slowly change color, from a milky white to a dark brown. When you first get a meerschaum pipe, be careful that your hands are clean as you smoke it for the first few times. Meerschaum pipes are coated in beeswax which aids in the coloring process and protects the brittle meerschaum. As the pipe heats during smoking (and be careful not to get it too hot) the beeswax melts. If your hands are dirty, the beeswax will pick up that dirt. Though some suggest not touching the bowl of a meerschaum pipe while smoking it, I think this is a little extreme. Just take care that your hands are clean and dry.

A sample 'Coloring' regimen:
There are many different ways to go about coloring your meerschaum pipe, but one of the simplest is as follows:
Smoke your meerschaum several times a day for about two weeks. Unlike a briar pipe, meerschaums do not need long periods of rest between smokes, and can safely be smoked multiple times in a day. Do, however, allow the pipe to cool between bowls. After this two weeks, your meerschaum should be noticeably heavier than when you began, owing to the amount of tars and oils now trapped inside the meerschaum. Put your meerschaum aside for a period of about one month. During this time, the beeswax will wick the tars and oils towards the surface of the pipe, coloring it in the process. Repeat and enjoy!

Before Smoking:
The care and cleaning of your pipe begins with your very first smoke, and should continue forward from there. Before each smoke, run a pipe cleaner, either bristle or regular, through the stem to dislodge any leftover ash and dottle, and gently tap your pipe on a cork knocker or the palm of your hand to remove these obstructions from the bowl. Be especially careful when tapping a meerschaum pipe to hold it by the shank, never by the stem!

While Smoking:
During a smoke is an excellent time to begin the process of caring for your pipe. You can begin by paying careful attention when lighting your pipe. Keep your flame source over the tobacco, so that it does not char the rim of your pipe. Unlike a briar pipe, it is near impossible to remove this rim charring from a meerschaum pipe, so it pays to be extra careful in this department. During smoking is also when you will notice if a more thorough cleaning is in order. If a pipe begins to taste sour, salty, or just plain bad while smoking it, it is probably time for a good cleaning. See Periodic Cleaning below.

After Smoking:
First, a warning: Always remove a stem from a meerschaum pipe by twisting it gently clockwise while supporting the shank with your fingers. At the end of each smoke, your pipe should be given a good cleaning. Dump out the ash and dottle, and run a bristle pipe cleaner around the inside of the bowl to remove any possible cake build-up. Unlike a briar pipe, a meerschaum requires no cake, and in some instances, a cake can be detrimental to a meerschaum, either slowing the coloring process, or causing the pipe to crack. Clean out the stem with a bristle pipe cleaner once, remove it, and either turn it around or use another pipe cleaner, repeating this process until the pipe cleaners come out clean. Moisten a pipe cleaner with saliva and rub the mouthpiece with it to remove any buildup there. Blow gently through the stem of the pipe to dislodge any leftover ash and wipe your pipe down with a soft dry cloth. Place the pipe back on it's rack or stand and allow it to cool.

Periodically:
You will want to, on occasion, give your pipes a more thorough cleaning than just swabbing out the stem after smoking. Most smokers do this fairly regularly, some going so far as to do so after all of their pipes have been smoked once, thus providing themselves with a fresh, clean rotation of pipes. You will have to experiment a bit with how often you do this clenaing to find what works best for you. To start this cleaning, carefully remove the stem of the pipe from the bowl and lay the two pieces on a paper towel. Dip a regular pipe cleaner in alchohol and run it through the stem, from the tenon to the mouthpiece, pulling it through. It will most likely come out with a bit of black or brown gunk on it. Follow this pipe cleaner with a dry one, and repeat until the moist pipe cleaner comes out the same color it was when it went in. Push one final dry pipe cleaner through to remove any moisture and set the stem aside.