It measures roughly 11.6 metres long, 11 metres wide, and just half a metre high, with a shallow depression at its centre. The mound is composed of burnt material, the accumulated debris of repeated prehistoric heating, and that combination of features identifies it as a fulacht fia. These are among the most common prehistoric monuments in Ireland, generally interpreted as outdoor cooking sites where stones were heated in fire and then dropped into a water-filled trough to bring it to the boil. The trough, often timber-lined, sat at the centre, and the cracked, fire-shattered stones were raked out and piled around it, forming the characteristic horseshoe or oval mound that survives today.

When the site was inspected in 1996, a cluster of oak trees had been planted directly on the mound, which gives it a slightly incongruous appearance in an otherwise open field. A second fulacht fia lies roughly 200 metres to the south-east, suggesting that this stretch of North Cork was a place of repeated or prolonged activity during the prehistoric period. The proximity of both sites to water is typical; a reliable water source was a practical necessity for however the troughs were being used, whether for cooking, processing hides, or other purposes that archaeologists continue to debate.