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“We want the same rights and protections as any cemetery has,” said Rick MacRae, 51, who gave the spirit name Northern Medicine Wolf. Mr. MacRae sat by a smouldering fire in the drizzle, under the protection of several tarps strung between the tall oaks. “Nobody would go and ride bikes in a Christian cemetery or a Jewish cemetery.”

At this spot, the shrubbery and undergrowth that normally carpets the forest floor is gone, apparently chewed up from persistent riding by a group of mountain bikers.

Beginning on Friday, the campers have used picks and long-handled shovels to carve away ridges in the area, made, they say, by BMX enthusiasts. The exercise has left the campers profoundly damp and quite covered in mud.

Yesterday, William Chief, a Cree from Loon Lake, Sask., worked with a shovel, leveling out one section of the sandy soil. As he worked, his BlackBerry buzzed; a correspondent asked, “How is your protest going today?”

He typed back, “I am still here in the rain, shoveling.”

As he worked, a flatbed truck with a crane attached pulled up outside a nearby gate, unloading a cement bunker about the size of a garden shed. Mr. Chief said it was a loan from the City of Toronto, as a spot for the occupiers to store their tools. The city is also delivering a portable toilet, he said.

Councillor Sarah Doucette (Parkdale-High Park), who met with the natives last Tuesday at City Hall, said she is aware of the “sit-in” and is “OK with it.”

“The city has had archeologists go and test, they’ve had about 40 test pits, and it does not show it to be a burial mound. However, we realize that the BMX bikes, as great as exercise and fresh air for these kids as it is, we want to return High Park to what it should be,” Ms. Doucette added.