Chinese zodiac - Actual dates for each animal?

[Silvana]

I've being seeing contradictory information about the chinese zodiac and when one animal year begins and the next ends. I've seen a lot of them that just list the years for each animal and I've read other places that the year doesn't start until early February. Does anyone know which it is?

[Fluffmeister]

The Chinese New Year always starts late January or early February - it starts at the New Moon around that time. So if you're born in January you may be the animal associated with the previous year.

[ValD]

Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_new_year) has a good article on the Chinese New year; it also has links to online calculators that can tell you what your Chinese birth year was.

[HemlockLemonade]

http://www.answers.com/topic/chinese-astrology

the calendar is towards the bottom.