It measures roughly nine metres east to west and five and a half metres north to south, rising to about eighty centimetres at its highest point. The opening, about three and a half metres wide, faces south, giving the whole structure the appearance of a cupped hand.

This is a fulacht fia, a type of prehistoric cooking or processing site found in great numbers across Ireland, typically dating to the Bronze Age. The working principle was straightforward: stones were heated in a fire, then dropped into a water-filled trough to bring it rapidly to the boil. Over repeated use, those stones cracked and became useless, and the discarded fragments accumulated around the trough's edge, forming exactly the kind of horseshoe or crescent mound visible here. The dark, charcoal-enriched soil mixed through the mound at Maughanasilly is the residue of those many fires. What makes the site particularly notable is that it does not stand alone. Two further fulachtaí fia lie within easy proximity, one approximately ninety metres to the west and another roughly thirty metres to the south, suggesting that this corner of Cork saw repeated, perhaps organised, activity over time. The site is partially damaged, though enough of the original crescent form survives to read the structure clearly.