46 BULLETIN 107, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 
Rev. C. W. G. Hifrig has sent me the following account of an in- 
cident, which well illustrates the ability of this species to conceal 
itself: 
It had been very dry for a long time. The sloughs were dry or nearly so. 
While walking through one, I saw a grebe in the fringe between the plant. 
growth of the center and the outer shore where there was hardly enough 
cover for a grasshopper to hide. ' Nor could it find cover in the center, for 
that is where I came from. It could not dive, because the water was only 
8 or 4 inches deep. So being forced to adopt desperate means, it threw itself 
over a tussock in the shallow watér, where at once it became invisible at a 
distance of 10 to 15 feet. And the tussock was only as large as 2 or 3 hands. 
Its neck was lying across, the body pressed against the side as closely as 
posible and so its colors harmonized exactly with the blackish brown of the 
tussock. 
Two somewhat similar incidents are related by Mr. Delos E. 
Culver (1914) which show that these and similar hiding poses are 
probably frequently used by pied-billed grebes. 
Fall.—On the fall migration these grebes proceed slowly through 
September and October, lingering on the inland ponds and small 
streams in family parties, in pairs or even singly, sojourning regu- 
larly in certain favorite spots, but working gradually coastwise. 
They show a decided preference for fresh water at all seasons, but. 
as the ponds and streams become frozen, they are forced to. resort to 
the open tidal creeks and estuaries. In such places they spend the 
winter on our southern Atlantic and Gulf coasts and as far north as 
Washington on the Pacific coast. They also winter to some extent 
in the rivers and open lakes of the interior, pirhicalarly: in the 
Southern States and Mexico. 
DISTRIBUTION. 
Breeding range.—Nearly entire North and South America in suit- 
able localities. In North America east to Quebec, New Brunswick, 
and the Atlantic Coast States. South to Gulf States and Mexico. 
West to the Pacific coast. North to Vancouver Island, central Brit- 
ish Columbia (Cariboo district), southern Mackenzie (Great Slave 
Lake and valley of the Mackenzie River), ou Ontario (Sudbury, 
Parry Sound district, and Ottawa). 
Actual nesting records for Central and South America are not 
numerous, but the species is resident south to Argentine Republic 
and Chile. The bird breeding in the West Indies has been separated 
as Podilymbus podiceps antillarum Bangs, but its validity has been 
questioned. 
Winter range.—Birds breeding in the northern United States and. 
southern Canada winter in the southern United States and Mexico. 
From New York and New Jersey (occasionally), Virginia (Ashland, 
Hanover County), and District of Columbia (Potomac River) south- 
