Abstract

Soil attributes are easily modified for different agricultural purposes, requiring the adoption of appropriate practices, according to the local particularities in order to maintain its production capacity. Given the above, this study aimed to assess soil physical attributes under different agricultural uses conditions in an Oxisol. The survey was conducted in Brazil with the following treatments: ​​Cassava monoculture area, beans monoculture and native forest. Results were interpreted with multivariate analysis. Native forest differed from the other agricultural uses due to surface consolidation, lack of soil preparation practices and increased organic matter input, having higher water retention. The conclusion was that there were statistical irregularities in soil attribute tendencies. Different agricultural uses interfered in the physical attributes when compared to the native forest, which produced better results, followed by bean and cassava monocultures. The most significant physical attributes to distinguish agricultural uses were: Aggregation; weighted average diameter; soil density; particle density; total porosity; field capacity and available water.

Key words: Soil properties, density, porosity, water retention.