If BEGIN is not called for each request then how the come END is?

I mean going by the logic that the BEGIN is only executed once when the script is loaded into memory, I would assume that the END is also only executed once when it leaves memory i.e the interpreter ends not the request.

that'll teach me to assume eh. regarding your problem I think you are probably right perls own garbage collection will hopefully save you the bother. .... This was annoying me, so google yielded this understanding mod_perl environments