The exact dates of the 2009 lunar year
The Earth Ox year ran from January 26, 2009 to February 13, 2010. Those 384 days are longer than a Gregorian year because a leap fifth month was inserted: 2009 carried thirteen lunar months rather than twelve, the same month number falling twice.
The 2009 new year fell 12 days earlier in the Gregorian year than the 2008 one, January 26, 2009 against February 7, 2008. Why the 2009 boundary sits where it does, rather than on any fixed date, is worked through in how the Chinese calendar works.
What the Earth Ox pairing is taken to mean
The stem for 2009 is Ji and the branch is the Ox, which the tradition reads as one unit rather than two. In 2009 that branch is taken to mean someone patient and immovable, doing the work whether or not anyone is counting it. Earth, the element attached to 2009, adds steadiness, patience and an attachment to what is already built.
2009 is a yin year, the inward half of the Earth pair: 2008 carries the same element in its yang form, and the two are read as the same material handled differently. Taken together, 2009 is described as the ox temperament working through steadiness.
Born in January or early February 2009
From 1 January 2009 to January 25, 2009 the animal in force was still the Rat, not the Ox — 25 days of 2009 that most zodiac tables hand to the wrong animal. Someone born on 15 January 2009 is a Rat.
The first Ox of 2009 is anyone born on January 26, 2009 or later, and the last one anyone born on February 13, 2010. Against the 21 January to 20 February window the new year can occupy, January 26, 2009 is at the early end.
Where 2009 sits in the sixty-year cycle
2009 is position 26 of sixty in the sexagenary cycle, the Ji stem against the Ox branch. Ten stems and twelve branches only realign after sixty years, so the previous Earth Ox year was 1949 and the next is 2069.
Someone born in 1949 therefore returned to their own pillar in 2009, at sixty, which the tradition marks as a full turn rather than a birthday. A child born in 2009 meets the pairing again in 2069.
Compatibility, and what it rests on
The Ox of 2009 is grouped with the Snake and the Rooster, four years either side: in this stretch of the calendar that is 2005 and 2013. Its opposition is the Goat, six years on from 2009 in 2015.
Those distances are arithmetic, not observation. Nothing about people born in 2009 was measured to produce them; 2009 stands four years from 2005 and six from 2015, and a twelve-part circle makes those the trine and the opposition just as it does in the western zodiac.
The western comparison for 2009
Because the 2009 lunar year opened on January 26, 2009, its first day falls under Aquarius in the western zodiac, and its last, February 13, 2010, under Aquarius — while the animal for the whole of 2009 stays the Ox.
Handbooks equate the Ox of 2009 with Capricorn, a pairing that lines up two twelve-part divisions rather than two claims about people. A western sign covers about thirty days, so 2009 holds twelve of them under one animal, and reading the 2009 Earth Ox as a year-long version of Capricorn flattens both systems.
Questions people ask about this
When did the 2009 Chinese new year start?
January 26, 2009, and the year ran on to February 13, 2010 — 384 days.
What animal is 2009?
The Ox, in its Earth form, from January 26, 2009 onward; a birth earlier in 2009 is a Rat.
Was 2009 a leap year in the Chinese calendar?
Yes — a leap fifth month made 2009 thirteen months and 384 days long.
I was born in January 2009 — which animal am I?
The Rat, unless you were born on January 26, 2009 or later, which is when the 2009 year began.