A cairn, in its simplest form, is a deliberate accumulation of stones or earth raised over a burial or used as a landmark, and this one carries enough of the right shape to warrant the name, even if it now gives little away. What makes it slightly peculiar is that it appears on only one edition of the Ordnance Survey six-inch map, the 1907 printing, where it is marked in the gothic lettering conventionally reserved for antiquities and labelled simply as a "carn". Earlier and later maps apparently pass over it without comment.

The mound itself measures roughly sixteen metres from northwest to southeast and seven and a half metres across, with a subrectangular outline and fairly steep sides on most of its perimeter. The northeast edge, where measurements were recorded, shows a kerb-like edge about half a metre wide and just under a metre high. The southwest side is less distinct, merging with a field wall that is notably broader than usual at its base, around one and a half metres wide, suggesting the boundary may have been built up using material from the cairn itself, or at least that the two features have become difficult to separate over time. A second field wall runs just to the north. No structural stones are visible anywhere on the surface, which makes definitive classification difficult; the mound could be prehistoric in origin, or it may have accumulated through agricultural clearance over many centuries, the drumlin top serving as a convenient dumping ground for gathered stones that have since sunk beneath the sod.