One of the characteristics of non-wood fibres is the much wider range of fibre lengths in different species (Atchison 1987). Many of these fibres, such as straws, reeds and bagasse, are similar in length to the short fibre hardwoods. On the other hand, others such as flax and hemp are so long that they have to be shortened prior to papermaking (Atchison 1987). From a quality point of view, any grade of paper can be produced by the combination of different non-wood plant fibres (Atchison & McGovern 1987). For instance, flax has a very long fibre length and.
