It is a fulacht fia, one of the most common yet persistently mysterious monument types in the Irish archaeological landscape. These are Bronze Age cooking sites, typically consisting of a trough dug into the ground beside a water source, a hearth for heating stones, and a surrounding mound of burnt and fire-cracked rock that accumulated over repeated use. The stones were heated in the fire and then dropped into the water-filled trough to bring it to a boil, a method capable of cooking large joints of meat. Thousands of fulachta fia survive across Ireland, but their sheer number has done little to resolve debates about exactly who used them, on what occasions, and whether cooking was always their primary purpose.

The mound at Glencollins measures roughly ten metres north to south and just over ten metres east to west, with a surviving height of around thirty centimetres, suggesting it has been partially levelled over time, most likely through centuries of agricultural activity. The opening of the horseshoe, which is about 1.7 metres wide, faces north. That orientation is notable in a small way; most fulachta fia are positioned near wet ground or streams, and the direction the mound opens often reflects the practical layout of the original trough and working area. The monument is recorded in the Archaeological Inventory of County Cork, Volume 4, covering the north of the county, published in 2000.