I am processing them one by one, it appears that perl keeps chewing space anyways. Here's the relevant section of code:

    foreach (sort keys %tickets)
    {
    my $ticket = ((split " ",$_)[0]);
    my %tick_inf;                            #hash to hold ticket info
    (%tick_inf = ars_GetEntry($rem,$schema,$ticket))
        || warn "Could not retrieve $ticket: $ars_errstr";    #populat
+e the hash with the ticket info
    my $field_data=$ticket;
    foreach (@$afield_names){    #these are the fields that we have be
+en asked to grab.
        $field_data .= " " . $sep;                #join the previous d
+ata with the seperator 
        unless (exists $hfield_names->{$_})
        {
            print "Bad field name -- $_\n";
            next;
        }
        unless (exists $tick_inf{$hfield_names->{$_}})
        {
            print $hfield_names->{$_} . "\n";
            print "Bad ticket info identifier -- $_ does not relate to
+: " . $hfield_names->{$_} . "\n";
            next;
        }
        unless ( defined($tick_inf{$hfield_names->{$_}}))
        {
            $field_data .= " ";
            next;
        }
        if (ref($tick_inf{ $hfield_names->{$_} }) eq "ARRAY")    #For 
+array references
        {
            my $data;
            foreach (@{ $tick_inf{ $hfield_names->{$_} } }) #foreach o
+f the values of the array ref
            {
                $data .= expand_hash($_);        #it's always a hash, 
+so expand it out (sub returns a string)
            }
            $field_data .= $data;
            next;                        #and hit the next value
        }
        if ($d_fields->{$_})                    #For dates
        {
            $field_data .= format_date(
                $tick_inf{ $hfield_names->{$_} }
                );                    #format the date (sub routine)
            next;                        #and hit the next value
        }
        if ($l_fields->{$_})                    #if the field is a sel
+ection value
        {
            $field_data .= $l_fields->{$_}->{         #change number i
+nto the name:
                    $tick_inf{            #fill the data from the $lis
+t field hash    
                    $hfield_names->{$_}         #
                        }            #
                    };
            next;
        }
        $field_data .= $tick_inf{ $hfield_names->{$_} };    #
                                    #value is in the ticket
        }#close foreach @$fields
       #more stuff which gets rid of $field_data
    }
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UPDATE: I added a } to properly denote the end of the foreach (@$afields) loop. It is redefined at the beginning of each ticket (foreach sort keys %tickets) {}. Sorry about the bad formatting, this is what happens when you cut and paste code. The problem is not in the $field_data (IMHO)

Note that before running this foreach loop the memory usage is relatively low (~40 meg). As this portion of the script runs the memory continues to increase (not an increase, then drop, then increase again). After this foreach loop we dump $field_data to a file and "undef" it.

So, is there a bug that I am not seeing in there? Is there some reason that this code is chewing up so much space?