cedar driftwood?

Just wondering if anyone has experience with cedar driftwood in the aquarium?
I brought home some really gnarly driftwood that I added to my new river set up. It occurs to me that there are a lot of cedar trees upstream from where I found it and it looks like it could be a cedar root.
It also occurs to me that I think I had read that cedar can be toxic to fish?

Hey Elijah, any idea what sort of cedars you have? Several different conifers go by that name. Some of them certainly have a lot of VOCs (volatile organic compounds) which are at least potentially dangerous to fish. I can tell you that I have put seasoned pieces of eastern red cedar in several tanks and have seen no toxic effects. I have heard of others using Atlantic white cedar in tanks. At any rate, thoroughly seasoned wood of nearly any species is safe, as everything but the lignin and a few other persistent compounds has decayed or leached away.

Hey Elijah, any idea what sort of cedars you have? Several different conifers go by that name. Some of them certainly have a lot of VOCs (volatile organic compounds) which are at least potentially dangerous to fish. I can tell you that I have put seasoned pieces of eastern red cedar in several tanks and have seen no toxic effects. I have heard of others using Atlantic white cedar in tanks. At any rate, thoroughly seasoned wood of nearly any species is safe, as everything but the lignin and a few other persistent compounds has decayed or leached away.

I do not know what kind of cedar it is. It grows on cliffs along the Winooski River in Winooski VT.
There was a slight bit of pink in the core of it. The circumference of the base of this piece is about 10 inches, so I wasn't worried about a slight bit of pink in the very middle. The wood is worn by the water and bleached by the sun. I cut into the other half that I did not use and could not smell the cedar scent.
I feel like it will be alright, but I have some Savannah Darters that I got from Dustin and I sure would hate to loose them!

I just did a water test and found that the Tank has close to .25ppm Nitrites. this tank has had fish and plants, and a filter in it for a month, so I wonder if it might have anything to do with the driftwood? The water was changed yesterday -75%.
I almost never get Nitrites in any of my 14 tanks, but the rest are much more heavily planted. This one just has a couple of Vals, about 10 Sagittaria Subulata, and a few peices of Hornwort and a Willow moss covered stone.
It is a 30 gallon long and is lightly stocked.

Anyway, Thanks for the info!