Jesse Males is an avid fly fishing, snook snatching, kayak paddling, tarpon slaying, mountain hiking, manatee swimming fool from Central Florida.  As such, he spent most of his time targeting saltwater species.   However, Redfish is his favorite fish to target on fly.

As soon as he started fly fishing, he started tying flies because he just thought that was what everyone was doing. Once he learned that not everyone tied their own flies, he quickly got into tying custom orders for people he knew and then branched off with his own custom fly-tying business.

Jesse is a father, husband, fly tyer, and passionate outdoorsman. Not only is he the owner of Backwater Fly Fishing, but also the fly tyer at his online fly shop, www.backwaterflies.com. In addition to spinning bugs for money, he is one of the guides/owners of the adventure guide service in Costa Rica, 506 Outdoors. They offer jungle trout fishing, machaca fishing float trips, pacific coast kayak fishing, as well as overnight beach camping tours to remote sections of the country.

Jesse is also a successful photographer and filmmaker.  He feels is one of the best ways to interact with the outdoors.  He loves being able to immortalize these awesome moments and environments we find ourselves in by capturing them through the lens.  He is proud to have a few films entered into some national and international film festivals culminating in his 2022 film ‘The Legend of Casa Mar’ winning the 2022 Fly Fishing Movie of the Year at The Drake Fly Fishing Video awards in Salt Lake City, UT.