Laurence Edwards explains why you shouldn't treat freshly cut cedar. Let it weather for 12 to 16 weeks first. The wood's natural oils need to evaporate so a vegetable-oil finish can penetrate deeply and last.
But a really important thing to say is when you're treating cedar, don't use fresh cedar. Cedar, very, very resinous, very high in oils, and what you wanna do is you wanna weather it for about 12 to 16 weeks first and then come back and then paint it or then oil it. And what you're doing there is you're letting the oils evaporate so that the oils in the product here, the vegetable oils, can seep deep into the product to give you really good, long-lasting protection.
