Welcome to the Forum ~ Rejuvenating an old orchard is definitely a labor of love. And though the trees are often very large, that’s not likely the way they were originally trained and tended. Left alone, onetime productive and well maintained trees develope the ‘tree inside a tree’ look, where unpruned ‘sucker shoots’ from the top of it’s branches have so dominated that they’ve shaded out the productive limbs below and the fruit is now a half-mile high. I’d inherited the same, thirty-something years ago.

It’s not impossible to eliminate the overgrown ‘shoots,’ but it’s extremely difficult to saw them off and pull them down and out, then keep the freshly exposed ‘original’ limbs from becoming sunburned. Also, though abandoned fruit trees often look vigorous, because of their size, they’ve usually hit a very delicate equilibrium, where there is very little new growth and the energy intake is needed to sustain their root structure. So if large portions of the tree are removed, equal portions of it’s roots will die.

But many homesteads have giant apple trees that can produce lots of apples. They’ll usually set heavy one year then rest the next ...and maybe the next... Impossible to thin, spray, and sometimes even harvest, ‘juice’ is usually the best you can do to utilize them.

As far as ‘what variety’ they are, it hardly matters, they are what they are. We’ve an ID Team with the HOS that could likely name them if you secured several specimens for the Fall, All About Fruit Show in October. Otherwise, most apple juice will work for cider, though a blend of sweets, bitters & sharps work best.

Personally, if the trees are on ‘standard’ or non-dwarfing rootstock, they’re not worth attempting to salvage. I’d figure out which are the most consistent producers and have an apple you find useful, then remove all the dead wood to allow better air circulation and lessen limb loads. If any are broken down, loaded with rot or barely hanging on, I’d remove and replace them. If the apple appears unusual, save a few ‘scions’ to have grafted onto some rootstock at our spring event and start a new ‘modern’ tree on dwarfing (or manageable) rootstock, with fruit identical to the source. Otherwise, I’d likely plant 3 replacements to every monster I removed. And as ‘mine’ were planted by my Great-grandfather, I did all I could to salvage them first. Some worked, most didn’t.