A Lyle man has pleaded not guilty to two counts of felony animal cruelty after police discovered two Labradors who died of starvation, dehydration and exposure.

Jacob McAlister, 30, appeared in Mower County District Court April 30. He was apprehended by the Austin Police Department on an outstanding warrant and placed in jail. Bond was set at $20,000 or $5,000 with conditions.

According to the police report, the Lyle police chief received a call April 2 from the Mower County Sheriff’s Office, who was seeking the defendant after discovering two dead Labrador retrievers in a kennel on the north side of a machine shed in Lyle.

The dogs — one black lab and one chocolate lab, “Rusty” and “Johnny” — had been obviously left unattended and were covered in a large amount of feces, records show.

Police contacted Barry Rush, an agent for the Humane Society, and took photographs of the scene.

On April 3, Rush, a deputy and a veterinarian met at the scene. The dogs were believed to have been dead for a few days in the kennel. Several inches of feces covered the kennel floor, and water was frozen in buckets.

The vet determined the dogs died of starvation, dehydration and exposure sustained from Jan. 1 through March 31. The chocolate lab — which appeared to have been partially eaten by the black dog — weighed 42.5 pounds. The black lab weighed 33.1 pounds.

Rush stated in an e-mail Monday that “the fact that the county attorney held firm with two felony counts is encouraging. …with continued public attention, perhaps we can, for once, get some justice for these two poor Labs.”

McAlister is scheduled for a pre-trial June 26.