Do tender fig fruits get sunburn in the same way that tender fig leaves do?  Are they likely to be negatively affected (e.g. scarred and/or dropped) or just discolored?

I had to move a bunch of fig plants outdoors unexpectedly last week.  Although they only get part sun for a few hours where they are, we've had some bright sunny days over the last week, and some leaves have been sunburned.  It looks like some of the fruits (that formed indoors on figs that broke dormancy early) may have a touch of sunburn, and a few small ones have been dropped.  I don't know if the small ones were dropped due to the sunburn or just the general shock of being moved outside abruptly and subjected to temperature swings and rain (or all of the above).

Any thoughts?
Jim

Any fruit exposed to sunlight can sunburn, right up to ripening. Generally, trees keep growing more branches and leaves, after the fruit forms, which shades the fruit. Sunburn is more likely when temps are higher.

Thanks, Jon.
Is it typically just cosmetic?  Or is it potentially traumatic -- e.g. scarring the skin so the fruit becomes misshapen as it grows, or leading to premature drop?
Jim

Jim I found the same occurence . A few trees developed figs while the trees were still on the porch and after they were placed outside in full sun I noticed sunburn on a few. There were not a lot of leaves to shield them as Jon said.
They are misshapened at the burn area , getting larger , no drop. We'll see.

Hi needaclone,
It is more common to have figs cold burned or damaged.
I have such figs - although at this point I almost knocked them myself. I did because the cold burned fruits wouldn't grow and younger fruits had grown bigger.
So for me, the fruits were damaged and wouldn't go through the ripening process - while still taking resources on the tree to be kept green .

I never had a sun burned fig - but my trees are outside in the dirt .
So a softy fruit could of course get burned by the sun. That fruit will be of inferior quality - so unless they are the unique fruits you'll get, just knock them off.
At least I would and I do that on my trees - except for a small "goutte d'or" that has 2 figs only and I'm not sure the tree will show a maincrop - and the tree will perhaps even drop the 2 brebas.
But that tree is still small - She started the season under 50 centimeters of height ... her small sister has no brebas ...
On my "Dalmatie tree 1" I knocked at least 12 damaged figs ... That's heart breaking :( .

Are you sure the fruits weren't cold burned ?
Normally being sun burned they should get cooked and should drop .

I'm not sure you have sunburned fruit. I've never had sunburn on fruit even in severe high temps. I've had scarring on fruit but I don't correlate that to sunburn because the rest of the plant looked fine. Some master gardener told me it could be bugs taking a tiny nip at an infant stage and as the fruit gets bigger the scarring is more pronounced.

Well, I have a number of trees that broke dormancy very early and have put on a lot of new growth and figs while they were still indoors.  During that time I tried to give them as much natural light as possible.  I also did not put them outside until late in May  (partly because the weather has been horrible, partly because I have lots of Ambrosia beetles flying around looking for tasty trees to bore into, and I didn't want to risk any of these trees.)
So, it definitely isn't a case of them getting cold-damaged.
In this case I don't think the sunburn is because of high temps.  I think it is because, like the leaves, they got accustomed to a certain light level while growing indoors and then got put out into the sun abruptly.  None of the trees were put in complete shade, and some of them got more sun than others.  I have some trees grouped together where there is no sign of sunburn on some, but some leaf sunburn on others.  I chalk that up to the different amounts of strong, direct sunlight they got while inside the house.
So, I'm really speculating that some of the figs on at least one tree were a bit on the tender side, not having gotten enough sun inside.  Then, when they got moved outside, they got more than they were used to.
A couple of figs on one tree got dropped.  They were some of the smaller figs on that particular tree.  One dropped within a day of being moved outside, but the others dropped after about 5 days.  Again, it may also be because of the general shock/trauma of being moved, temperature cycles, rainstorms, etc. within the last week.  I believe some leaves on that tree are also a bit sunburned.
Jim

Sunburn may just be cosmetic, when mild. Can cause tougher skin, but the interior can still be fine. If it is in a really hot climate (AZ, for example) the sunburn will not be the issue. It will be a sign that the tree has insufficient canopy, and the fig is probably getting cooked on the inside because of the exposure to extreme temps.

By the time I got around to moving my trees out of the garage a few had developed figs. A few of them sun burned.