What Chinese Zodiac Is 2015? Year of the Wood Goat

2015 Lunar New Year: start and end dates

Lunar New Year opened the Wood Goat year on February 19, 2015, and the year ran to February 7, 2016. So a birth date of Feb 19, 2015 or later counts as Wood Goat, and so do early 2016 birthdays through Feb 7; births in 2015 before Feb 19 still belong to the Wood Horse. That moving boundary comes from the lunisolar calendar, in which the new year starts with the second new moon after the winter solstice in most years, so its Gregorian date shifts by up to a month from one year to the next. Look sixty years either side and the pairing repeats: 1955 are Wood Goat years too. That Thursday new year arrived with the Sun in Pisces in the Western zodiac.

What the Wood Goat is like

Tradition pictures the Wood Goat tending a garden that feeds the whole street. With Wood controlling Earth, the Goat's gentle nature is nudged outward into fairness and service. People born now are often compassionate helpers with a gift for crafts or music. Learning to receive as well as give, and trusting their own judgement, keeps that kindness sustainable. Their quiet care often binds communities together.

In the five-element scheme, Wood belongs to the east and to the green energy of early spring, and that seasonal image shapes how it colours an animal sign. A Wood stem tends to soften sharp edges and add warmth, curiosity and a cooperative instinct. Traditional texts associate it with benevolence, growth and the wish to build something that lasts beyond the self. People born under a Wood stem are often portrayed as principled, open-handed and hopeful about others. The caution usually attached to Wood is a habit of spreading energy thinly, saying yes to every request and feeling quietly hurt when generosity is not returned in kind.

2015 in the animal cycle and in numerology

In numerology the digits reduce to 8, associated with ambition, authority and material results, so an 8 year is described in terms of effort and reward. The digits of 2015 add up to 8. The Goat holds the eighth place among the twelve animals and its fixed element is Earth. Set beside the year's Wood stem, wood controls Earth, which readings use to describe how settled or stretched the combination feels. The year before was the Wood Horse and the year after is the Fire Monkey.

Chinese almanacs name 2015 Yi-Wei, pairing the Wood stem Yi with the branch Wei. Both are Yin, as stem and branch always share a polarity, so of the hundred and twenty possible pairings only sixty ever occur, and each one names a single year in every cycle.