What it means
The Dog is the zodiac's protector. Dog people tend to have a strong sense of right and wrong and little patience for hypocrisy. They are usually reliable friends and hard workers who do their best for the people and causes they believe in. Because they take loyalty so seriously, they can be wary of new people and slow to forgive betrayal.
Strengths
Loyalty, honesty, fairness, reliability and courage on behalf of others.
Challenges
Worry, pessimism, stubbornness and suspicion toward people they don't know well yet.
Dog years and dates
A Dog year starts at Lunar New Year, not on January 1. Dog years since 1950: Earth Dog, February 18, 1958 to February 7, 1959; Metal Dog, February 6, 1970 to January 26, 1971; Water Dog, January 25, 1982 to February 12, 1983; Wood Dog, February 10, 1994 to January 30, 1995; Fire Dog, January 29, 2006 to February 17, 2007; Earth Dog, February 16, 2018 to February 4, 2019. The next Dog year, a Metal Dog, starts on February 3, 2030. If you were born in January or February, check the start date: a birthday before it belongs to the year before.
Element
Every Dog year also carries one of five elements, which cycle so the same element and animal meet only once every 60 years. A Dog born in 1982 is a Water Dog. The Dog also has a fixed element of its own, Earth, and is a yang sign.
Best and hardest matches
Traditional Chinese astrology puts the twelve animals in four groups of three, and in six opposite pairs. The Dog gets on most easily with the Tiger and the Horse, the other two in its group. Its opposite is the Dragon, six years apart, which is said to bring the most friction.
How Cosmic Array reads it
Cosmic Array reads your animal next to your Western Sun sign. Together they give your Primal Zodiac, one of 144 combinations: a Cancer Sun born in a Dog year, for example, is a Golden Retriever. The Architect blueprint shows your animal, its element and your Primal Zodiac, worked out from the exact Lunar New Year date, and reads them against the rest of your chart.