The site is known almost entirely from a cropmark, the kind of faint discolouration that appears in aerial photographs when buried features, such as a fosse or filled-in ditch, cause the vegetation above them to grow at a slightly different rate than the surrounding ground. In this case, the cropmark revealed the outline of a rectangular enclosure with rounded corners, measuring roughly 35 metres east to west, photographed from the air in July 1989. Nothing is visible at ground level; the enclosure announces itself only when seen from above, and only under the right conditions of light, moisture, and crop growth.

A fosse is simply a defensive or boundary ditch, and rectangular enclosures of this general type are known from various periods in Irish archaeology, though their dates and functions can be difficult to pin down without excavation. What makes the Parkacunna site particularly interesting is its proximity to two other significant features. A second rectangular enclosure sits roughly 80 metres to the north-west, suggesting this part of north Cork may have seen repeated or overlapping episodes of enclosure and land use. More striking still is the Claidh Dubh, a major linear earthwork running approximately 180 metres to the west. The Claidh Dubh, whose name translates loosely as the black ditch or dark boundary, is one of the more enigmatic monuments in Munster, a long boundary earthwork whose precise age and purpose remain matters of scholarly discussion. The enclosure at Parkacunna sits quietly in its shadow, one small piece of a much larger and still poorly understood landscape.