"An enthusiastic geologist, one of Ibbetson's finds on the Isle of Wight, the fossilised remains of a "Hybodus", was sent to Sir Philip Malpas de Grey Egerton, and was discussed in the Proceedings of the Geological Society in 1845.During the 1840s, Ibbetson was also engaged in various geological surveys associated with the expansion of the British railway system, during which work he corresponded with eminent geologist Henry Thomas De la Beche.