Hair-less

Sweet corn can be
fished right on the
hook.

I've been doing a lot of carp fishing seminars this winter at various shows.  One question that keeps coming up is "do you need to use the hair rig?". The simple answer is no.  The hair rig allows easy use of harder baits such as boilies, maize, tiger nuts, chick peas, artificial corn, etc.  All those baits must be threaded with a baiting needle and then put onto the hair and held in place with a hair stop. I also think the hair rig generally gives the fishermen a big edge in hooking a fish since that exposed hook will always get the carp in the lip.  If you are using soft baits such as sweet corn or dough baits, you can put the bait directly on the hook and you should have decent success.
Having said all that I fished today without using a hair rig. That's because I was using sweet corn and the fish were on the small side. I was also using a small hook (#10) and I was putting only one or two kernels of sweet corn on the hook which was attached to a foot long monofilament leader or hooklink. It worked like a charm as I had my best day of 2017 with 12 carp up to 8 lbs. on the bank.

This is one of 12 carp landed today on sweet corn fished on the
hook. This technique works best with small hooks.

Sweet corn is working great right now, but be aware that as soon as the warmer weather comes along and the pests (turtles, bluegills, dace and horned pout) get more active, the sweet corn will be picked apart whether you use it on the hair or on the hook.  I got a taste of that today as I landed my first bluegill of the year on a single kernel of sweet corn on the hook and had other baits taken off the hook with little taps of the rod tip.