Effect Of Land Use Land Cover Changes On Soil Erosion And Soil Physico-chemical Properties In Upper Eyiohia River Watershed Nigeria

The study was conducted to assess and estimate the impact of land use land cover changes onrnsoil erosion losses and physicochemical properties in the upper Eyiohia river watershed inrnNigeria. The Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE) parameters were integrated withrnsatellite remote sensing and geographical information systems (GIS) as a useful tool torndetermine the extent and mean annual soil losses. Land Use Land Cover Change within the studyrnperiod (1996 and 2016) indicates that cultivated land increase by 3400 ha, settlement by 2300rnha, bare land by 2600 and grazing land 300 ha while forest has significantly declined by arearncoverage of 8600 ha. The change is brought about by land conversion from forest to farmlandsrnand growing demand for food from ever increasing population substantiated from surveyrnquestionnaire administered to 100 respondents. Results shows that the mean soil loss in 2016rnwas higher in cultivated land 48.34 t ha-1 y-1 followed by forest (36.92 t ha-1 y-1), bare landrn(19.40 t ha-1 y-1), settlement (8.02 t ha-1 y-1), and grazing land (14.48 t ha-1 y-1). Soil with erosionrnseverity classes of high, very high, severe and very severe jointly accounted for 96% of the totalrnsoil loss of the entire Eyiohia watershed covering 83% of the total area while the remaining 4%rnis under low ris categories. Result on Selected physicochemical properties as affected byrndifferent Land use type indicate that BD, TP, AWC, FC, Mn and Zn were significantly differentrnp

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