I knew my image was going to have a horse as the subject as i live next to two horse breeders. That was the easy part, in total i think i shot around 500 images over two consecutive mornings. out of all the images this one stood out as it appeared there would be the need for little editing (to my eye anyway)
Raw adjustments.
Slight crop.
high pass sharpen in photoshop.
Resize for web.
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My overall impression of your photo is that it is a pleasant scene but I think you could have shown it off better. There is quite a lot going on, and changing your angle to use either the lane or the wires to lead the eye across the shot might make it easier to follow.
Technically: It's an interesting choice of settings. Your lens is not at its best at f3.5, but equally you are not using a wide aperture to isolate your main subject by throwing the background right out. As a result it sits between the camps of 'lots of blur' and 'deep depth of field'. I think that it would be better in the latter personally, so I would stand back a little, zoom in a little and throw the aperture up to about f7.1, which should bring the dog into focus. If necessary, you could boost the ISO, 400 is easily achievable on that body. For lighting, your subject is slightly backlit. I reckon a little fill flash (even from the onboard) would lighten this up a little, maybe give the eye some sparkle.
Artistically: You have used the rule of thirds well, but with all of those leading lines around, I would suggest a slight change of angle to use them to work across the diagonal of the shot. You have also used a point of view looking down on your subject, which a way we often see animals and therefore struggle to get excited about. Perhaps kneeling or lying down to get a level or even upward shot would have produced something more interesting? I would probably go for level here. The aim is to make people see a familiar thing in a new way.
PP: A little use of the shadow/highlight tool might iron out some of the balance of dark and light, and tone down the harshness of the light on the grass. It also looks a little yellow, which some hue/sat could help with. I would be tempted to boost contrast a little with curves.
In summary, this is a nice shot of a horse, but by playing with the angles, and deciding whether you want 'a horse', or 'a scene with a horse in it' and select your settings from there.
personally to me this pic captures the essence of country life very well, something creative. well framed, having the dog in the bg works well here, very interesting shot, all the best!
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