The funnel at the top, through which limestone and fuel were loaded, has collapsed, but the main body of the structure survives, along with the ramp at the rear that workers would once have used to tip material into the kiln from above. For something so functional, and so thoroughly agricultural in purpose, it has a certain solidity to it.

Lime kilns were a fixture of the Irish rural landscape from at least the seventeenth century through to the early twentieth. The process was straightforward but demanding: limestone and layers of fuel, usually coal or wood, were packed into the kiln through the top, the fire was set, and after days of burning the resulting quicklime was raked out through the arched opening at the base, the draw hole, and then slaked with water for use as a soil conditioner or mortar. The arched recess here, measuring 2.3 metres high and 1.8 metres wide with a depth of 2.25 metres, is the kind of proportioning designed to take that heat and draw efficiently. The sloping slabs visible to the rear of the recess are typical of this form of construction, helping to direct the burned material downward toward the draw hole. Most kilns of this type were built and used by individual landowners or farming communities for local needs, and they rarely appear in formal records unless they were particularly large or associated with a significant estate.