NIS exhausts system resources

I'm using a -CURRENT NIS client against a -STABLE server. When I can ssh
in, things work, so this is not the SSH issue reported here several times.

But sometimes, using NIS spins the system to the effect it's unusable. The
logs are full of:

kernel: file: table is full
syslogd: /dev/console: Too many open files in system
rpcbind: rpc: failed to open /etc/netconfig
rpcbind: warning: /etc/hosts.allow, line 23: cannot open /etc/hosts.allow: Too many open files in system

If I'm lucky and have some open session, I can type "reboot" in it and
after a while things shut down cleanly. If not, I can't login (or can't
execute reboot) and have to do a hard reset.

When does this happen, you ask? I triggered it this morning by booting the
machine when the NIS server was down. I had also seen it in the past when
configuring NIS, and it happened as soon as I set the domainname.  Any
ideas? I can provide packet captures on request, however note the failure
where the server is down.

Configuration details:
rc.conf:
nfs_server_enable="YES"
nfs_client_enable="YES"
mountd_flags="-r -l"
nisdomainname="foo"
nis_client_enable="YES"
rpc_lockd_enable="NO"
rpc_statd_enable="YES"
rpcbind_enable="YES"
rpcbind_flags="-l"
amd_enable="YES"

nsswitch.conf:
passwd: nis files
group: nis files

tail of passwd:
-:*:0::::
+:*:::::

Thanks in advance,

-- 

  Dan Pelleg