/ˈdɛt.ɹi.əs/ (regarding use even in speech, i.e. as a misconstruction and not just a typo or misspelling, cf [1], [2])
book where detrius is used consistently:
1991, June C. Kennedy, A View from the Heart: Bayou Country Ecology (→ISBN):
[page 71:] In Louisiana, the bacteria and algae combination that constitutes most detrius better than doubles the food value of the original living plant. These algae, and the detrius with which they are always mixed, are the most abundant food […]
[page 77:] Fields of marsh grass, “flotant” islands of grass, chenieres rich with live oaks, still waters thick with detrius - viewing the estuary in this way it is not hard to see the “gold” we have here in Louisiana.
[index, page 140:] detrius.........71, 71
book only uses detrius (but only once), and never uses detritus:
1901, History, Topography, and Directory of Cumberland (T. Bulmer & Co), page 959:
The detrius of moraines is also stated to occupy the greater part of the valley of Eamont, from Uliswater to its junction with the Eden. On the south frontier of these mountains similar moraines are found in Westmorland and Lancashire.
1996, Hilton Hotema, The Lost Word of Freemasonry, page 5
In its glacier-like progress, language has brought down along the ages the detrius of tongues that were spoken millions of years before the art of recording by writing was developed […]
