Plot in months not years (setting xaxis limits)

Does anyone know how I can change the datenum to plot selected months rather than the whole dataset in years? e.g. I am just wanting to looking the data from 1998-2000

Attached is what my plot looks like already, the data and below are my 2 scripts. Any suggestions would be appreicated, thanks.

function data=load_CH_data(filename)
 
% function to load tide data from Giovanni
% input is the filename of the data file
% output is the date/time and SST from the data file
% tmp=tempory l=line
 
data.filename=filename;
 
fid=fopen(filename);
 
%Skips headerlines
for I=1:10
    tmpl=fgetl(fid);
end
 
J=1;
while ischar(tmpl)
    %5 strings
    tmp=textscan(tmpl,'%s %f','Delimiter',',');
 
    %data.t(J)=datenum( cell2mat(tmp{1}),'yyyy/mm/dd HH:MM:SS');
    data.t(J)=datenum( cell2mat(tmp{1}) )
    data.CH(J)=tmp{2};
    
    tmpl=fgetl(fid);
    J=J+1;
end
 
data.CH(data.CH==-32767) = NaN;
fclose(fid);

function plot_CH_data(data)
 
% function to plot the Giovanni data imported with load_giovanni_data
 
%subplot (2,1,2)
%clf

plot(data.t,data.CH,'.c-','Markersize',15,'Linewidth', 1.4)

% t_start = datenum(1998,01,08);
% t_end = datenum(2000,12,31);

datetick('x')
ylabel('Chlorophyll (mg m^-^3)', 'fontsize', 18)
%ylabel('Plankton (mg m^-^3)', 'fontsize', 18)
xlabel('Year', 'fontsize', 18)
legend ('Chlorophyll 1997-2006')%,'Zooplankton 1995', 'Zooplankton 1996','Zooplankton 1997','Zooplankton 1998','Zooplankton 1999','Zooplankton 2000','Zooplankton 2001','Zooplankton 2002', 'Zooplankton 2003', 'Zooplankton 2004', 'Zooplankton 2005', 'Zooplankton 2006')
%title('-4.9438,50.647,-4.7351,50.9436,  2002-2012 SST', 'fontsize', 14)
end

Answer 1

[KALYAN ACHARJYA]

xlim

[Miriam Daughtery]

I tried that and it doesn't work. Have you been able to do it with xlim? it's in dates and will not plot if I use xlim...