If you have a south or west facing window you sure can over winter them inside. I have been doing it for more years than I can remember. There are other ways to save them for the next year too, but I'll get into that in a bit. First here is what I do. I try to get the shortest bushiest ones.I remove all the flowers and buds, and cut them back, to a leaf, to make a nicely shaped plant. I pot them up and put them in my south facing window. I only fertilize once or twice during the winter with diluted strength and only water when they are dry. When they get tall shoots during the winter, I cut them back. Every time you cut them back they make new shoots and I want this so I can take cuttings in the spring. I got 41 cuttings off of 4 plants this spring. If you have a cold cellar or a place that is just above freezing you can store them there for the winter and let them go dormant or you can hang them upside down, bare root, in a paper bag(punch holes in the bag) For both these 2 you need a cool dry dark place that is just above freezing. In the spring, pot up the bare roots--the rest is for both ways. Move into indirect light and give a little water. Not too much--they have no feeder roots yet. Gradually increase the water and move more and more into direct sunlight and only then when they are growing well give them a mild 1/4 strength fertilizer I hope this helps

We have to make a one week trip out of state come late January so we are going to do the following starting New Years weekend and hope it works for us. We are going to purchase a 16 gal. heated bucket and drill a small hole 1" from the bottom of the bucket on its side. Then, we are going to take one of those indoor heavy-duty storage tubs (it will be about 4 or 5" larger around the bottom) and we are going to cut it about 4-5" up from the bottom of it to make a water tray. We are going to set the heated bucket (with the hole drilled in it) into the tray and hopefully, as the heated bucket warms up the water in the bucket it will also warm the homemade water tray it sits in enough so the water in the tray will not freeze. A friend of ours may have to add to the water bucket, maybe once, but we think this will work for us. I'm searching for the best priced, good quality heated bucket at the current time and will have it in service the weekend of New Years. If anyone wants to know how it works, email us, in the subject of your email type in "Heated Chicken Waterer", we will let you know!

Good questions! As long as you keep some vines alive and healthy until spring, you can use the rooted tips as slips. The challenge is avoiding indoor pests like spider mites and whiteflies. For this reason I would limit how much vegetation you have growing, keeping in mind that whatever roots are present now will be in very bad shape by planting time in late spring. I suggest propagating your stock now, by rooting a fresh crop of stem tips in water, and then potting up some of those plants in late winter. They will grow into lush little plants that can be sunk into a bucket of sand when the weather warms in late spring, forming the foundation stock for your sweet potato slip nursery. Hope this helps.

All azaleas tend to loose their leaves. Deciduous azaleas loose their leaves every fall and get new ones around May some time. Evergreen azaleas have dimorphic leaves, known as spring and summer leaves. The spring leaves unfold at the beginning of the growing season and are dropped in autumn. Summer leaves emerge in early summer and are smaller, thicker, darker, and more leathery than spring leaves. They remain on the plant during the dormant period and drop in the spring, however, summer leaves may persist for several years in warm climates. Some "evergreen" azaleas are deciduous in colder climates. Sometimes this is called being semievergreen. Wait until mid May for signs of life. It is good that they don't break dormancy before our last chance of frost.