Though the leak may be capped this week, the Gulf oil spill will affect wildlife for years to come.





A brown pelican is seen on the beach at East Grand Terre Island along the Louisiana coast on Thursday, June 3, 2010. Oil from the Deepwater Horizon has affected wildlife throughout the Gulf of Mexico. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)





A brown pelican is seen on the beach at East Grand Terre Island along the Louisiana coast on Thursday, June 3, 2010. Oil from the Deepwater Horizon has affected wildlife throughout the Gulf of Mexico. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)







A brown pelican coated in heavy oil wallows in the surf June 4, 2010 on East Grand Terre Island, Louisiana. Oil from the Deepwater Horizon incident is coming ashore in large volumes across southern Louisiana coastal areas. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)





A laughing gull coated in heavy oil wallows in the surf June 4, 2010 on East Grand Terre Island, Louisiana. Oil from the Deepwater Horizon incident is coming ashore in large volumes across southern Louisiana coastal areas. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)





A brown pelican coated in heavy oil tries to take flight June 4, 2010 on East Grand Terre Island, Louisiana. Oil from the Deepwater Horizon incident is coming ashore in large volumes across southern Louisiana coastal areas. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)





A brown pelican coated in heavy oil wallows in the surf June 4, 2010 on East Grand Terre Island, Louisiana. Oil from the Deepwater Horizon incident is coming ashore in large volumes across southern Louisiana coastal areas. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)





A brown pelican coated in heavy oil tries to take flight June 4, 2010 on East Grand Terre Island, Louisiana. Oil from the Deepwater Horizon incident is coming ashore in large volumes across southern Louisiana coastal areas. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)





A dead Northern Gannet covered in oil lies along Grand Isle Beach in Grand Isle, Louisiana May 21, 2010. A month after the well blowout and rig explosion that unleashed the catastrophic spill, sheets of rust-colored heavy oil are starting to clog fragile marshlands on the fringes of the Mississippi Delta, damaging fishing grounds and wildlife. Scientists fear parts of the huge fragmented surface slick will be sucked to the Florida Keys and Cuba by ocean currents.

REUTERS/Sean Gardner





Biologist Mandy Tumlin from the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries recovers a dead dolphin off of Grand Isle, Louisiana, on Saturday, May 29, 2010. The dolphin will be taken for testing to see if its death was due to exposure to toxins from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. (Carolyn Cole/Los Angeles Times/MCT)





A dead sea turtle is seen laying on a beach as concern continues that the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico may harm animals in its path on May 5, 2010 in Waveland, Mississippi. It is unknown if the turtle died due to the oil spill. Oil is still leaking out of the Deepwater Horizon wellhead at a estimated rate of 1,000-5,000 barrels a day. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)





A Plaquemines Parish employee lays oil absorbent boom as pelicans leave their nests on an island in Barataria Bay, just inside the the coast of Louisiana, Saturday, May 22, 2010. The island is home to hundreds of brown pelican nests as well at terns, gulls and roseated spoonbills and is being impacted by oil from the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)





A laughing gull flies in the breeze on Raccoon Island, Louisiana May 14, 2010 as an oil structure is seen in the background off the Louisiana coast in the Gulf of Mexico. The tiny island, which is home to nesting gulls and birds, is unprotected by booms and reported to have had oil deposits washed up on its shore earlier this week from the BP oil spill. REUTERS/Hans Deryk





A dead turtle lies in the surf as concern continues that the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico may harm animals in its path on May 3, 2010 in Bay St Louis, Mississippi. It is unknown if the turtle died due to the oil spill. Oil is still leaking out of the Deepwater Horizon wellhead at an estimated rate of 1,000-5,000 barrels a day. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)





Danene Birtell, left, of Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research, Patrick Hogan, right, of International Bird Rescue and Research Center, and Christina Schilleci, background right, clean an oiled pelican from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in Buras, La., Thursday, June 3, 2010. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)





A dead drum fish is seen laying in the surf as concern continues that the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico may harm animals in its path on May 5, 2010 in Waveland, Mississippi. It is unknown if the fish died due to the oil spill. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

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