"Let's clean up our act. No more trash talk. Let's find a way," EcoLogical says on its Facebook page.

Photo by Michael Armstrong The members of the Ecological team. From left to right are Adi Davis, Sydney Paulino, Taylor Ellison, Hannah Baird and Katherine Dolma.

That's their immediate goal, but EcoLogical has bigger plans: They want to win the 2009 Lexus and Scholastic EcoChallenge, a national contest inspiring teenagers to take positive action for the environment. First-place teams win $15,000 in grants and scholarships, and grand-prize teams win $30,000.

If their success since starting the challenge Oct. 1 is any measure, Sydney Paulino, Taylor Ellison, Katherine Dolma, Adi Davis and Hannah Baird can start counting the Benjamins.

Already, EcoLogical has persuaded Kenai Peninsula Borough Waste Management to put up a "tin bin" at the Baycrest Hill dump to recycle tin cans.

Davis is a ninth-grade homeschooled student and the other girls are all eighth-graders at Homer Middle School.

EcoLogical took a visit of the dump, including the recycling tent. Although everything from batteries to some plastic can be recycled, missing was a container for tin.

"I think they were thinking about it, but when we asked them, they really hustled on it," Dolma said. Her mom, Brenda Dolma, is the group's adviser.

After making a presentation to the borough school board and the Homer Middle School site council, the girls convinced the middle school to quit using Styrofoam trays in the cafeteria. That's 13,000 non-recyclable trays that won't go into the dump.

"The council just rolled with it because they thought it would be a great thing to do for the school," Baird said.

For a fun way to teach people about recycling, at 1 p.m. Saturday at the Alaska Islands and Ocean Visitor Center EcoLogical holds a fashion show featuring clothing made from recycled and reused items. Fiber artists like Ann-Margret Wimmerstedt will be showing their designs, but anyone with recycled or reused fashions is encouraged to enter their works. Prizes will be awarded in professional, open adult, teen and elementary school age categories.

EcoLogical has until Nov. 6 to finish the challenge. Teams have to enter a PowerPoint presentation showing their accomplishments.

Monday, the girls toured the Alaska Islands and Ocean Visitor Center's recycling operation. Dan Thorington of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service showed how he had achieved an 84 percent recycling rate at the center. As they listened to him, the girls ate snacks and sandwiches. They weren't food-starved growing teenagers - it was their lunch hour.

"These girls are very busy girls," Brenda Dolma said. "The time slot these girls have had is lunch time."

EcoLogical gets together three times a week to work on its projects and plan events or take field trips. They formed after Dolma found about the EcoChallenge and asked her daughter if she and some friends wanted to do it. The five girls all know each other from Girls Scouts and decided to go for it. They have grown up learning about and caring for the environment and had a natural interest.

"All of us are really into environmental stuff," Davis said.

Dolma said her parents raised her to care for the environment.

"This is how we live, and also where we live," she said. "It's so beautiful that you want to take care of it."

Most of the girls grew up in Homer, but Ellison didn't come here until the fifth grade. She said her friends taught her about environmental awareness.

"It naturally grows on you to become aware, especially with the people I hang out with," Ellison said.

It's an influence she's passed on to her parents, like her father, a well driller, who know recycles pipes and copper from his work.

EcoLogical has one more project it wants to do before the deadline. They asked Thorington for ideas, and he suggested trying to get South Peninsula Hospital to improve its recycling program.

Ellison said she thinks EcoLogical has a good chance at winning.

"Oh yeah. I have no doubt about it," she said. "I'm very optimistic, though."

"I definitely think we have a good chance with all the work we're doing and the results," Baird said.

If EcoLogical wins, the girls said they want to put in recycling bins at Homer Middle School and maybe even start a compost bin.

Winning the EcoChallenge would be great, but the girls said they've already achieved something.

"Even if we don't win, we will still have cut down our trash load by a lot," Baird said.

EcoLogical has a blog at www.1ecological.blogspot.com, with links there to their Facebook and Twitter pages.

Michael Armstrong can be reached at michael.armstrong.@homernews.com.