Abstract
Soil structural stability facilities soil water movement and retention, erosion, crusting, nutrient recycling, root penetration, oxygen; which are major factors for assessing soil quality for cultivation guide to provide information necessary to establish management practices that will improve the soil for better use. A study was conducted in Akwa Ibom State University Teaching and Research Farm to examine structural stability and erodibility on three land use type, namely: rubber plantation, oil palm plantation and Forest plot. Soil samples were collected from the study area and analyzed in the laboratory for physical and chemical properties. Data generated were fitted into empirical models for computation of structural stability and erodibility indices (water dispersible silt, water dispersible clay, water dispersible sand, aggregated clay, sodium adsorption ratio, soil erodibility factor and water erosion prediction project). The result indicates that sand was the dominant particle-size fraction. Among the three land use type, forest plot did not record high values in erodibility indices showing less susceptible erodibility action, while Aggregated Clay in oil the palm plot had high value, been more stable than the rubber and Forest plot. The result is yet to be put into findings. Fe correlated positively with Al (0.912*); Mg positively correlated with Fe (0.538*), and Al (0.584*) negatively correlated with water erodibility prediction project (-0.802*) and Sodium adsorption ratio (-0.855*), while Al negatively correlated with water erodibility prediction project (-0.624*), Aggregated Clay (-0.836*) and Sodium adsorption ratio (-0.582*). This information can be used to develop management practices in the study area.