Well I'm going to suggest the opposite, but then I'm only a biochemist.
Alternate wetting and drying is about the worst thing you can have for almost any protein and will accelerate its denaturation. Water indeed causes expansion and softening of virtually all proteins making them easier to deform and split apart under stress, e.g. riding and this deformation is rarely fully reversible. Alternating wet and dry only exacerbate this and actually just keeping them wet is probably marginally better. This isn't obvious when the foot is still a bit "swollen" with excessive moisture but is very apparent when it dries back and the cracks become more obvious. The water is in effect camouflaging the problem not curing it. It also makes the proteins easier to attack by bacteria which much prefer damp conditions and lots of nice fine cracks and degraded material to hide in and feed off. I realise its a bit different but this is essentially what happens in Mud Fever and Rain scald too, excessive moisture and abrasives causing damage which bacteria exploit.
We seem to forget that horses were essentially animals of arid areas, both hot and cold and in those situations few of the problems such as this are seen. In Saudi Arabia for example, where its generally fairly dry, there were few problems of this type with horse hooves until about ten years ago when green lush pastures and tracks became the norm for their racehorses due to the availability of desalinated water. The horses were regularly on then off these relatively wet areas and suddenly all sorts of previously rare hoof conditions started to appear and few now think it a coincidence.
In the UK last year , when we had a substantial drought, hoof problems of this type became much rarer but other problems such as percussion damage in racehorse became much more common. Another thing to bear in mind is that hoof problems are often only apparent months after the initial insult, damaged tissue can take a while to grow down to the bearing surface where the consequences are most easily seen. For example just because its wet now and you don't see a problem you can't assume that nothing is happening any more than you can conclude that the dry weather in four months time ( oh please stop raining!) caused the problems which are apparent then.
This year in the UK its been much wetter, but with a very dry April, and many more hoof problems are being seen again.
Its water , especially regularly alternating wet and dry that is the problem, not the solution.
It's very difficult to cure situations like this any more than it is possible to cure the weather but I have found that the product used by Les Spark, the EnduranceGB barefoot champion in 2004 to be very effective as he obviously has. No veterinary failures due to hoof problems in endurance competition riding for years isn't a bad result. And his horses live out all year on the North Yorkshire Moors. Its tough up there.
Try contacting him via his web site he's really friendly and has tons of hands on practical advice from both riding and trimming his own horses feet.
http://www.fnesaddles.com/Hooves-Barefoot.shtml
