Note that the study area lies to the south of the Carboniferous carbonate platform facies represented by the outcrops in the Burren. This carbonate platform interfingers with the deeper water mudstones and limestones of western Co. Clare that underlie the Clare Basin and the Shannon trough. The deeper water of this setting persists through the deposition of the Clare Shale and then starts to fill with the Ross Formation through Gull Formation and terminates with the shallower water setting of the delta system of the Central Clare Group.