I have a module called IO::All::SCP under development that uses Net::SSH::Perl to do an "scp" by connecting to the server and running cat. I don't know if such an approach would work for you.
Since I'm pulling down a file, and since the remote end is a switch, not a server, this approach doesn't help me, since there is no 'cat' command at the far end (or anything even close, I don't think).