False Springs often lure these birds toward the northern areas before the ice is out. They cannot get awing except from water and many perish by starvation on snow banks or in open fields. They are less gregarious than other Grebes altho their wild wailings and harsh "love yells" are unsurpassed by relatives.
When an off shore wind flattened surf of Great South Beach, Long Island, in Winter, I frequently chased them, in a fourteen foot catamaran but I never got one!
North America, from northwestern Alaska to Atlantic seaboard (Winter). South to southern California, Colorado and Ohio valley.