It is the kind of site that rewards knowing what you are looking at, because the visible remains give little away. What lies beneath the vegetation is the accumulated debris of a fulacht fia, a type of prehistoric cooking or processing site found in considerable numbers across Ireland, typically in low-lying, waterlogged ground exactly like this.

A fulacht fia, sometimes spelled fulacht fiadh, works on a simple principle. A trough is dug into the earth, often timber-lined, and filled with water. Stones are heated in a nearby fire and dropped into the trough until the water reaches a boil. The shattered, fire-cracked stones are then raked aside, and over repeated use they accumulate into the characteristic horseshoe-shaped mound that survives on so many sites. Most examples date to the Bronze Age, roughly 1500 to 500 BC, though the practice may have continued later. What exactly they were used for is still debated: cooking is the traditional explanation, but experiments and analysis have pointed to other possibilities including brewing, textile processing, and bathing. The Berrings example sits in the company of at least one other nearby site, with a second fulacht fiadh recorded approximately forty metres to the south, suggesting this particular stretch of low ground saw repeated or sustained use over time.