When creating an Element with a ref from inside of a constructor an error is thrown in production mode, but not in dev mode.

Here is a minimal sample:
https://jsfiddle.net/84v837e9/35/

An error, "Only a ReactOwner can have refs", should happen in dev and production modes.

This is happening in React 15.4
if (__DEV__) {
      var Component = this._currentElement.type;
      if (Component.contextTypes) {
        this._checkContextTypes(
          Component.contextTypes,
          maskedContext,
          'context',
        );
      }
    }
    return maskedContext;
  },
  /**
   * @param {object} currentContext
   * @return {object}
   * @private
   */
  _processChildContext: function(currentContext) {
    var Component = this._currentElement.type;
    var inst = this._instance;
    var childContext;
    if (typeof inst.getChildContext === 'function') {
      if (__DEV__) {
        ReactInstrumentation.debugTool.onBeginProcessingChildContext();
        try {
          childContext = inst.getChildContext();
        } finally {
          ReactInstrumentation.debugTool.onEndProcessingChildContext();
        }
      } else {