need to find all records with 2009 from a date string of XX/XX/XXXX

[eluser]Flying Fish[/eluser]
hi all,

I have a database of records which contain a date field, formatted as a string

example: 12/25/2009

I need to return all the records for the year 2009 only, any thoughts on the best way to do that?

I guess I could use a foreach loop in combination with php's string functions, but I was wondering if there is a better way to do it.

Thanks!