These are the remnants of charcoal production, an industry that once shaped woodland management across Ireland. Each platform, measuring roughly nine metres by six metres, was levelled into the hillside to provide a stable working surface where timber could be stacked into a carefully constructed mound, covered with turf or earth to restrict airflow, and burned slowly over several days to produce charcoal. The process is known as collier work, and the platforms themselves are sometimes called hearths or pitsteads.

The site at Lugduff is notable for its scale. Surveys have recorded around 75 of these platforms at irregular intervals along the northern and southern shores of the Upper Lake, with a further cluster to the west and southwest of Reefert Church, a small Romanesque ruin associated with the early monastic settlement of Glendalough. A separate count recorded approximately 40 similar platforms in the same general area. References to these features appear in published work from as early as 1940, cited by Ua Riain, and again in a 1972 study by Healy, suggesting that the platforms had been noticed and documented across several decades without attracting wide attention. The sheer number of platforms points to sustained and organised charcoal production rather than occasional or incidental burning, though the precise period of activity is not recorded in the available sources.