【Objective】Undisturbed woodland and cultivated land soils from vertical and horizontal directions were collected across different latitudes in typical black soil regions in Northeast China for this research. The objective was to investigate the effects of long-term tillage in cultivated land on the black soil hydrological degradation. 【Method】 Nine typical cultivated land units were selected across three latitudes, including Jiusan Farm Management Area in Nenjiang (48°46′N), Hailun (47°30′N), and Bayan County in Harbin (46°23′N). Intact soil cores were collected from 0-15 and 15-30 cm depths in vertical and horizontal directions to determine soil penetration resistance (SPR), and hydraulic properties (water retention and saturated hydraulic conductivity (K_s). 【Result】 Results showed that soil SPR significantly increased in cultivated land compared to woodland, and the SPR in tillage pan layer (15-30 cm) (897.04 kPa) was 1.89 times higher than that in woodland. Soil hydraulic properties also significantly decreased in cultivated land, whose soil available water decreased to 0.15 (0.10-0.21) cm³·^–3 compared to 0.19(0.14-0.23) cm³·^–3 in woodland. Using soil physical quality index S to assess the over black soil quality showed that S value decreased from excellent 0.061 (0.041-0.094) in woodland to poor 0.025 (0.009-0.040) in cultivated land. The degradation of cultivated land quality was attributed to the significant reduction in soil organic matter content and significant increase in soil bulk density (1.31 g·cm^–3 in cultivated land vs. 1.03 g·cm^–3 in woodland). Long-term ridge tillage resulted in a 10 times reduction in Ks in tillage pan layer (6.61 cm·d^–1), and this can be attributed to the disruption of balance between tillage and tillage pan layer and enlargement of magnitude difference for Ks and bulk density between two layers. Tillage resulted in a lower K_s in the vertical direction (64.67 cm·d^–1)than in the horizontal direction (82.84 cm·d^–1) in the tillage layer. The K_s decreased in a larger degree in the vertical direction and less degree in the horizontal direction. Thus, this heterogeneity of K_s in directions interfered the original water movement direction in tillage layer. The low hydraulic conductivity of the plough pan tends to accumulate precipitation and produce lateral interflow.【Conclusion】 Generally, long-term tillage has severely degraded the physical and hydraulic properties of the soil. The huge difference of soil compactness and K_s between the tillage layer and plough pan produced an artificially stratified soil in cultivated land. The limitation of water infiltration is a dominant reason for the "furrow effect" in cultivated land.